Things To Do In SW Florida

As a homeowner, you likely have a lot more equity in your house than you did just a few years ago.

U.S. homeowners gained almost $3 trillion in equity in the fourth quarter of 2024 compared to the previous year, according to data from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.

While your home equity shouldn’t be the first place you go to cover a cash shortfall, a home equity line of credit (HELOC) can be a useful resource in a short-term financial crisis.

How to know if a HELOC is the best move for your emergency

Before applying for a HELOC, consider whether it makes the most sense for your financial situation. HELOCs and other home equity products use your home as collateral, meaning you could lose it to foreclosure if you can’t keep up with your monthly payments.

If your emergency poses a long-term threat to your financial stability, a HELOC may be more risk than reward. However, if there’s a clear end in sight and you just need to get over an expensive hill, a HELOC could be the right move.

For example, you could be planning a leave of absence from work for medical reasons but know that you’ll return within a few weeks or months. Even with emergency savings and insurance, you could find yourself in a “short-term cash crunch,” says Thomas Carson McLean, certified financial planner and founder of Altruist Wealth Management in Charlotte, NC. In this case, a HELOC could act as a financial bridge until you’re back to work. read more

The deadline to file your taxes is April 15. But not if you live in Florida.

The Internal Revenue Service extended the deadline here to May 1 because of a series of hurricanes that slammed the state — Debbie in August and then the two-fer Helene and Milton two weeks apart in September and October.

The new May 1, 2025, tax filing deadline date, rather than the traditional April date this year, applies to people and businesses who live or are based anywhere in Florida, not just the counties that got hit from the 2024 storms.

The reprieve covers the following entities who traditionally must file by April 15: individual, corporate and estate and trust income tax returns. Also, partnership returns, S corporation returns, gift, and generation-skipping transfer tax returns; annual information returns of tax-exempt organizations and employment and certain excise tax returns.

If you plan to mail your return, wisit usps.com for regular business hours of post offices. There are no plans for extended hours on either date — April 15 or May 1, but some post offices regularly are open after 5 p.m. said Postal Service spokeswoman Debbie Fetterly in an email to the Miami Herald.. read more

The deadline to file your taxes is April 15. But not if you live in Florida.

The Internal Revenue Service extended the deadline here to May 1 because of a series of hurricanes that slammed the state — Debbie in August and then the two-fer Helene and Milton two weeks apart in September and October.

The new May 1, 2025, tax filing deadline date, rather than the traditional April date this year, applies to people and businesses who live or are based anywhere in Florida, not just the counties that got hit from the 2024 storms.

The reprieve covers the following entities who traditionally must file by April 15: individual, corporate and estate and trust income tax returns. Also, partnership returns, S corporation returns, gift, and generation-skipping transfer tax returns; annual information returns of tax-exempt organizations and employment and certain excise tax returns.

If you plan to mail your return, wisit usps.com for regular business hours of post offices. There are no plans for extended hours on either date — April 15 or May 1, but some post offices regularly are open after 5 p.m. said Postal Service spokeswoman Debbie Fetterly in an email to the Miami Herald.. read more

By BRIAN WITTE and BARBARA ORTUTAY, AP Technology Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg took the stand on Monday in a historic antitrust trial that could force the tech giant to break off Instagram and WhatsApp, startups it bought more than a decade ago that have since grown into social media powerhouses.

The Federal Trade Commission called Zuckerberg as its first witness, as it seeks to prove that Meta acquired Instagram and WhatsApp to preserve its monopoly in the social networking space.

In opening statements, FTC attorney Daniel Matheson said Meta has used its position to generate enormous profits even as consumer satisfaction has dropped. He said Meta was “erecting a moat” to protect its interests by buying the two startups because the company feared they were a threat to Meta’s dominance.

Zuckerberg and other key Meta witnesses will testify throughout the trial.

“We’re going to give them their chance to tell their side of the story,” Matheson said.

Mark Hansen, an attorney for Meta, said the FTC was making a “grab bag” of arguments that were wrong. He said Meta has plenty of competition and has made improvements to the startups it acquired. read more

Jeff Bezos’ fiancee Lauren Sánchez led an all-female crew including pop singer Katy Perry and CBS Mornings co-host Gayle King for a short trip to space Monday morning.

Riding on Bezos’ Blue Origin’s suborbital New Shepard rocket, the six women — a group which also included Aisha Bowe, Amanda Nguyen and Kerianne Flynn — lifted off from the company’s West Texas launch site at 9:30 a.m. EDT.

This was the 11th human spaceflight for New Shepard, and 31st mission overall. The flights have sent the capsule on short 10- to 12-minute trips that lets passengers experience a few minutes of weightlessness and see the curvature of the Earth before their capsule returns for a parachute-assisted landing.

They traveled above the Karman line, about 62 miles high, the internationally recognized altitude of having reached space.

Screams of excitement and raucous laughter could be heard over the live stream of the launch on both the way up and  the way down. While experiencing weightlessness, though, the crew became quieter. read more