Imagine a world where many of your daily activities were constantly monitored and evaluated: what you buy at the shops and online; where you are at any given time; who your friends are and how you interact with them; how many hours you spend watching content or playing video games; and what bills and taxes you pay (or not).

With respect to remedies upon breach of contract, specific performance is a legal action brought in a court of equity to compel a party to carry out the terms of a contract, whereas liquidated damages is an amount predetermined by the parties to an agreement as the total amount of compensation an injured party should receive if the other party breaches a specified part of the contract.

While we applaud Freddie Mac for having undertaken an effort to assemble relevant data to investigate the topic of appraisal discrimination, it was premature to publish a note based only on “exploratory research” limited to a single race-based correlation, with no attempt to present a rigorous analysis regarding other potential explanations. 

Without a doubt, my vote for the Best Book I’ve read this year goes to The New Grand Strategy by Mark Mykleby, Patrick Doherty, and Joel Makower. I know that Saul Klein and Terri Murphy join me in that vote.

A variance is an exception to the existing zoning, whereas a nonconforming use (also known as a grandfather clause) arises when there is a change to the zoning but an existing use is still permitted to continue.