Friday, March 15, 2024

🏡 Axios PM: Real estate revolution

Plus: Metro mascots | Friday, March 15, 2024
 
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Axios PM
By Mike Allen · Mar 15, 2024

Happy springtime Friday... and happy St. Patrick's weekend!

  • Today's newsletter, edited by Sam Baker, is 460 words, a 2-min. read. Thanks to Sheryl Miller for copy editing.
 
 
1 big thing: New real estate frenzy
Illustration of four different people's hands reaching to grab one suburban house.

Illustration: Annelise Capossela/Axios

 

The real estate industry may have just turned itself upside down. The National Association of Realtors announced a legal settlement today that would eliminate agents' standard 6% commission.

Why it matters: "It will absolutely transform the real estate industry," Max Besbris, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told the N.Y. Times.

✄ What's next: If the settlement wins final approval, real estate agents would be able to compete for business by taking smaller commissions — leaving more money in sellers' pockets and boosting online brokerages in the process.

  • Lower commissions could lead to lower prices — good news for buyers.

🤔 The other side: There may be a catch for buyers on a tight budget.

  • Right now, sellers' agents split their 6% commission with buyers' agents — buyers basically get an agent for free. But as commissions fall, more buyers will have to pay out-of-pocket for someone to help them find a home, Charlotte real estate agent Jeff Clay told Axios' Brianna Crane.
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2. ⚖️ Willis can stay on Trump case
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis at the Fulton County Courthouse in Atlanta on March 1. Photo: Alex Slitz via Getty Images

Fani Willis won her battle: A judge ruled today that she can remain in charge of prosecuting former President Trump in Georgia, as long as special prosecutor Nathan Wade stepped down — which he has now done.

  • But Trump is winning the war: Although the evidence surrounding Willis' romantic relationship with another prosecutor didn't get her kicked off Trump's case, "an odor of mendacity remains," the judge wrote.

🐢 What's next: The whole ordeal has already delayed the case.

  • Trump's lawyers have successfully delayed his Jan. 6 trial, most likely until after the election. It's not clear when the trial over his handling of classified documents will start. Prosecutors in his New York hush-money case have agreed to a potential delay.
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A message from Meta

Cataracts are the primary cause of avoidable blindness
 
 

FundamentalVR and Orbis International created a VR training platform that helps surgeons practice cataract surgery.

The impact: More surgeons have access to the training they need to treat cataracts around the world.

Explore the impact of the metaverse.

 
 
3. Catch me up
1.    Above: At the Largo Argentina archeological site in Rome today, members of a historical society, Gruppo Storico Romano, reenact the Ides of March — March 15, known as the date on which Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC.

Photo: Yara Nardi/Reuters

 
  1. 🏛️ Above: At the Largo Argentina archeological site in Rome today, members of a historical society, Gruppo Storico Romano, reenact the Ides of March — March 15, known as the date on which Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 B.C.
  2. 📣 The Supreme Court ruled that some public officials can be sued for blocking their critics on social media, SCOTUSblog reports.
  3. 🕥 Prosecutors said Sam Bankman-Fried should serve as much as 50 years in prison, Bloomberg reports.
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4. 🏀 1 for the train
Screenshot: Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority via X

Commuters on the D.C. Metro yesterday had some unexpected company — mascots from some of the best college basketball programs in the country, who are in town for the ACC tournament.

  • 🚇 The tournament is being held at Capital One Arena, which is easily accessible to every Metro line.

The semifinals are tonight: Pitt faces No. 1 seed UNC at 7 p.m., followed by N.C. State vs. Virginia.

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A message from Meta

"VR let me practice hundreds of times before I operated on a patient"
 
 

Dr. Baid used FundamentalVR and Orbis International's VR platform for additional training in a hands-on environment.

Why it's important: In the past year, Dr. Baid has performed 300 life-changing surgeries to preserve her patients' vision.

Discover other stories.

 
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