Apartment Building Amenities Jump the Shark—and Everything Else You Need to Know About This Week
Royal Caribbean's flashy new $165 million beach club is bringing cruise ship amenities to shore. But islanders fear the Paradise Island resort will divert tourism from local Bahamian businesses. (The New York Times)
Fremont, California, just became the first U.S. city to buy its own citywide flood insurance, betting on fast payouts over slow federal aid in light of Trump's plans to dismantle FEMA. (Bloomberg)
Thomas Moser, founder of Thos. Moser Cabinetmakers, dies at 90, leaving behind a legacy of handcrafted furniture admired by presidents and popes alike. (Portland Press Herald)
Builders are scrambling to hoard materials as Trump's tariff chaos threatens to drive up costs—by as much as $10,000 for a single family home. (The Wall Street Journal)
Tea rooms, yoga studios, and rooftop terraces: Developers are folding these amenities and more into apartment buildings to lure in buyers and renters with the fantasy of all-in-one lifestyle hubs. But without thoughtful design, the perks risk being more hollow than helpful. (The Architect's Newspaper)
TikTok is reshaping the building trades, with plumbers, home inspectors, electricians, and welders gaining new business by sharing behind-the-scenes glimpses of their work on the social media platform. (Dwell)
Top image courtesy of Darcstudio

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CNBC
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- CNBC
Kelly Evans: The tariff math
Here's a puzzle that's been bothering me: how can we be seeing substantial tariff revenues, flattish inflation, a stronger-than-expected economy, all at the same time? In other words, if U.S. companies are paying upwards of $100 billion already in tariffs, their only two choices are to pass that along to customers, or to absorb it in the form of smaller (or non-existent) profit margins. So we should either be seeing stickier inflation, or less hiring--or even layoffs. And yet we so far have neither. So what gives? This was the essence of what Treasury adviser Joe LaVorgna and I were debating on Power Lunch yesterday. And the answer--the missing puzzle piece, this rosy situation continues--is that foreign exporters are cutting their prices. Japanese automakers, for instance, reportedly slashed prices by 19% in June for vehicles shipped to North America. China's factory prices slid 3.6% last month--the sharpest drop in two years. Think of it this way: take an import that cost $1,000 last year. Now, let's say it faces a 20% tariff. But the exporter cuts its price by even more. Suddenly, you have tariff revenues price deflation for the end consumer, without any hit to the importer's margins. This is an extreme example, of course. But it gives a sense of the myriad behind-the-scenes adjustments right now that could explain how we can have a sizeable amount of tariff revenues (now the fourth biggest income source for the U.S. government), without a bigger economic toll--at least, as of yet. By Goldman's estimate--as they, too, have been surprised by the smallish impact--foreign exporters have so far absorbed about 20% of the costs of tariffs. The rest is divvied up between businesses and consumers, but so far less is being passed along to consumers now than during the first Trump administration, they have found. It seems that U.S. companies took the brunt of the remaining hit initially, which explains the confidence and stock-market shock we saw in April when the news first hit. But as time passes, they have gone from passing along of their tariff costs, to 40% of them by month three to consumers, per Goldman. If that rises to 50-60%, as Goldman expects, core PCE could hit 3.3% by December, up from 2.7% in May. Point being, the "stagflationary" tariff outcome still remains a possibility. But for now, the tariff effect is so dissipated amongst different parties--exporters, consumers, business, and even currency markets--that it's had a much lesser than feared impact. "Tariffs are not inflationary. They'll be absorbed in foreign profit margins," LaVorgna insisted yesterday. So now the key question for stock market bulls, the Fed, and the U.S. economy is whether the coming months prove him right or not. See you at 1 p.m! Kelly Twitter: @KellyCNBC Instagram: @realkellyevans


Time Magazine
a minute ago
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Ukraine Gets New Government, Races to Boost Arms Production
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Fox News
a minute ago
- Fox News
Timeline of 'scam artist' Adam Schiff's mortgage fraud allegations stretching back years
Longtime President Donald Trump political foe Democrat California Sen. Adam Schiff was referred to the Department of Justice to face criminal prosecution over alleged mortgage fraud that reportedly stretches back years. Schiff, who was elected to the Senate in the 2024 election cycle following decades as a House lawmaker, is under scrutiny after the U.S. Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) sent a letter to the Department of Justice in May sounding the alarm that in "multiple instances," Schiff allegedly "falsified bank documents and property records to acquire more favorable loan terms, impacting payments from 2003-2019 for a Potomac, Maryland-based property." FHFA is an independent federal agency that oversees Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Home Loan Bank System. This week, Trump publicly lambasted Schiff over the alleged mortgage fraud, while Fannie Mae's financial crimes investigations concluded Monday in a letter to the FHFA that Schiff allegedly engaged in "a sustained pattern of possible occupancy misrepresentation" on five Fannie Mae loans, Fox News Digital previously reported this week. "I have always suspected Shifty Adam Schiff was a scam artist," Trump posted to Truth Social Tuesday. "And now I learn that Fannie Mae's Financial Crimes Division have concluded that Adam Schiff has engaged in a sustained pattern of possible Mortgage Fraud." "Adam Schiff said that his primary residence was in MARYLAND to get a cheaper mortgage and rip off America, when he must LIVE in CALIFORNIA because he was a Congressman from CALIFORNIA. I always knew Adam Schiff was a Crook. The FRAUD began with the refinance of his Maryland property on February 6, 2009, and continued through multiple transactions until the Maryland property was correctly designated as a second home on October 13, 2020." Potomac, Maryland, is a suburb of Washington, D.C., located just more than 10 miles away from the nation's capital across the Maryland border. Trump and Schiff have long been political foes, which was underscored during Trump's first administration when Schiff served as the lead House manager during the first impeachment trial against Trump in 2020 and when Schiff repeatedly promoted claims that Trump's 2016 campaign colluded with Russia Fox News Digital took a look back at the timeline of Schiff's Maryland home, and when the public was first made aware in 2023 of allegations that Schiff claimed a more than 3,000-square-foot home in the suburbs of Washington as his primary residence, while taking a homeowner's tax exemption on a small condo in his home state of California. The investigation into Schiff's mortgages and homes follows a similar mortgage investigation earlier in 2025 focused on New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is also a longtime political Trump foe. The FHFA sent a criminal referral to the Department of Justice in April arguing the attorney general appeared to have falsified mortgage records to obtain more favorable loans. At the heart of that case is a Norfolk, Virginia, home James purchased in 2023, which she identified on mortgage documents and a Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac form as a property that would serve as her primary residence, according to the FHFA letter from April. James is legally required to live in New York as a statewide elected official in the Empire State. Fox News Digital reached out to Schiff's office for additional comment on the matter, but did not immediately receive a reply.