Author: josh

Timor-Leste, Southeast Asia’s smallest economy, is now ASEAN’s newest member.  On Oct 26, the regional body voted in the island nation as its eleventh member at the ASEAN Summit in Kuala Lumpur. Timor-Leste first applied for membership in 2011, just under a decade after it won formal independence from Indonesia, its much larger neighbor. Timor-Leste, also known as East Timor, is ASEAN’s first new member since 1999, when the bloc welcomed Cambodia into the group. “Timor-Leste has struggled with securing investments, due to the country’s instability and associated risks,” says Norashiqin Toh, a post-doctoral fellow at Tsinghua University’s Institute for…

In This Article This article is presented by NREIG. Your tenant hosts a weekend barbecue, and a guest trips on a loose deck board, falls down the stairs, and breaks their wrist. Three weeks later, you get served with a lawsuit demanding $150,000 in medical bills, lost wages, and pain and suffering. The crazy part is, you could be personally liable. And even if you have homeowners’ insurance, it often does not cover this sort of loss or lawsuit. Most landlords focus on finding great tenants, maintaining properties, and maximizing cash flow. But without the proper liability insurance, you could…

Zillow’s second product launch of the year includes collaborative search. Buyers can now invite family and friends to help them search and discuss listings through in-app messaging. A little more than three months after its breakout summer feature launch, Zillow is introducing another slate of new features for consumers. The features include: Virtual staging: Available only on Zillow Showcase listings, buyers can virtually redecorate listings with several curated design styles, including modern, Scandinavian, industrial, midcentury, luxury, coastal and farmhouse. The tool also allows buyers to instantly switch furniture arrangements or clear the room for a blank slate. Zillow Home Loans: Following…

CEO Agenda provides unique insights into how leaders think and lead and what keeps them busy in a world of constant change. We look into the lives, minds and agendas of CEOs at the world’s most iconic companies. When Iñaki Ereño assumed the role of Group CEO of Bupa in 2021, the global healthcare landscape was being rewritten in real time. At the helm of a company serving over a million customers worldwide, Ereño faces the challenge of transforming a large and established organization into a faster, more agile, and digitally enabled provider of care.  Founded in 1947 with the…

If it’s time to sell and your house is in a flood zone, you may be concerned about getting the best price for your home. The good news is that there are plenty of buyers interested in purchasing properties regardless of the flood zoning. In this article, we’ll review everything you need to know if you’re selling your home in a flood zone, from insurance to mitigation to pricing strategies. The basics of FEMA flood zone classifications and the implications of each designation FEMA (the Federal Emergency Management Agency) is responsible for evaluating flood zones in the United States. As…

Dave:New construction is reshaping how deals are getting done and it’s changing where the numbers actually work. It’s sort of crazy, but right now, on average, a newly built home in the US is cheaper than an existing home, making this a uniquely attractive investment. Right now, I’m Dave Meyer and today on the Market I’m joined by Doug Brien to dig into when new builds beat existing homes, how institutional investors are actually behaving and what you can learn from them and how to negotiate with builders to land a great deal on a newly constructed home. This is…

For decades, American politicians and investors have snickered at the nations that gave birth to Western democracy — Italy and Greece — as examples of fiscal excess. Italy, with its revolving-door governments, and Greece, with its bailouts and austerity hangovers. But now, it’s their transatlantic descendant that’s writing the biggest checks. According to new forecasts from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), America’s debt—which recently surpassed $38 trillion—is set to rise faster than almost any advanced economy, climbing from roughly 125% of GDP today to about 143% by 2030. That would push the U.S. above both Italy, which has a debt…

More than half of the grades handed out at Harvard College are A’s, an increase from decades past even as school officials have sounded the alarm for years about rampant grade inflation.  About 60% of the grades handed out in classes for the university’s undergraduate program are A’s, up from 40% a decade ago and less than a quarter 20 years ago, according to a report released Monday by Harvard’s Office of Undergraduate Education. Other elite universities, including competing Ivy League schools, have also been struggling to rein in grade inflation.  The report’s author, Harvard undergraduate dean Amanda Claybaugh, urged…

A shortage of air traffic controllers caused more flight disruptions Monday around the country as controllers braced for their first full missing paycheck during the federal government shutdown. The Federal Aviation Administration reported staffing-related delays on Monday afternoon averaging about 20 minutes at the airport in Dallas and about 40 minutes at both Newark Liberty International Airport and Austin-Bergstrom International Airport. The delays in Austin followed a brief ground stop at the airport, meaning flights were held at their originating airports until the FAA lifted the stop around 4:15 p.m. local time. The FAA also warned of staffing issues at a facility in Jacksonville,…

When the Trump administration froze foreign assistance overnight, urgent efforts began to figure out how to continue critical aid programs that could be funded by private donors. Multiple groups launched fundraisers in February and eventually, these emergency funds mobilized more than $125 million within eight months, a sum that while not nearly enough, was more than the organizers had ever imagined possible. In those early days, even with needs piling up, wealthy donors and private foundations grappled with how to respond. Of the thousands of programs the U.S. funded abroad, which ones could be saved and which would have the biggest impact if they continued? “We were fortunate enough…