Before launching into fictional series featuring Coach Ernie Creekmore, Tom served The Seattle Times readers for 20 years, first as a sportswriter and later as real estate reporter, columnist and editor.

His ground-breaking book How a Second Home Can Be Your Best Investment (McGraw-Hill, written with economist John Tuccillo) showed consumers and professionals how one additional piece of real estate could serve as an investment, recreation, and retirement property over time.

His other books include Real Estate Boomers and Beyond: Exploring the Costs, Choices and Changes of Your Next Move (Dearborn-Kaplan); The New Reverse Mortgage Formula (John Wiley & Sons); Cashing In on a Second Home in Mexico (Crabman Publishing, with Mitch Creekmore); Cashing In on a Second Home in Central America (Crabman Publishing, with Mitch Creekmore and Jeff Hornberger), and Bargains Beyond the Border (Crabman Publishing).

Tom’s award-winning radio show Real Estate Today aired for 25 years on KIRO, the CBS affiliate in Seattle. The program also has been syndicated in 40 domestic markets and to 450 stations in 160 foreign countries via Armed Forces Radio.

Tom and his wife have four children and live on Bainbridge Island, WA, where they back the runnin’, gunnin’ Bainbridge High Spartans when not wrestling with three of their five grandchildren.