Emmanuel Fonte | Music | Art | Leadership
If music be the food of love, play on. Emmanuel Fonte website is about music, art, real estate, architecture, design and decor. Occasionally, I talk about my other passion, hockey.
Guz architects, and their incredible homes, are no strangers to Bless This Stuff. The Meera house. Facing the coast of Singapore’s Sentosa Island, the Meera house is built around an open air stairwell that floods the house with tropical ocean breezes, allowing its resident to take full advantage of the Singapore’s spectacular climate. 
source: Bless This Stuff
There’s been a lot of talk about the lack of inventory on the market lately. I’ve used a few graphical charts to express the data this past week. Here is a heat map expressing the levels of inventory in our area. 0-3 months – Seller’s advantage. 3-6 months – Balanced market. 6+ months – Buyer’s advantage.
On the left March 2011. Inventory levels benefited the buyers at that time. Jump to March 2012. The Sellers are in control at the moment. While sellers may be happy, the market really need more sellable inventory.
Living near a high-scoring public school district can raise home values $205,000 higher compared to homes located in neighborhoods with low-scoring school districts, according to a new study by Brookings Institution. Brookings analyzed the nation’s 100 largest metro areas to find the differences between living near a high-scoring public school and a low-performing school.
“We think of public education as being free, and we think of the main divide in education between public and private schools,” Jonathan Rothwell, a senior research analyst at Brookings, told The New York Times. “But it turns out that it’s actually very expensive to enroll your children in a high-scoring public school.” The cost of living in a high-scoring public neighborhood can be higher than paying a private tuition at a school, researchers note.
Housing costs near high-scoring schools — those in the top one-fifth of schools in the area — were 2.4 times higher on average, or $11,000 more per year, than homes located in school districts in the bottom fifth, the study found.
“Some of the areas with the largest differences in housing costs also have the widest gaps in school test scores,” reports CNNMoney about the study’s findings.
Students from low-income families — classified as those who are eligible for free or reduced-price school lunches — were found to be more likely to attend schools that score in the 42nd percentile on state tests, according to Brookings. On the other hand, students from middle- to high-income households, on average, tend to attend schools that score in the 61st percentile.
Source: “Test Scores and Housing Costs,” The New York Times (April 19, 2012) and “Living Near Good Schools will Cost an Extra $200k,” CNNMoney (April 19, 2012)
click image for larger view.
Did you know that every two days as much data is created as was created since the dawn of civilization until 2003?
With that much data out there, it’s no surprise that sync has become an integral part of our everyday lives. Whether it’s keeping your emails synced across devices, sending a file via Dropbox, or keeping up with your business by syncing your contacts, calendars, tasks, and more with CompanionLink, sync is nearly everywhere.
Take a look at the infographic below to see just how prevalent sync is in our everyday lives! 
Ninety percent of population is massed within 100 miles of northern American border.
Seems not to mind that one of its provinces has turned almost entirely French.
Excessive politeness only makes sense as cover for something truly sinister. But what?
Citizens seem strangely impervious to cold.
Decriminalization of marijuana and acceptance of gay marriage without corresponding collapse of social institutions indicate Canada may, in fact, be indestructible.
Has infiltrated entertainment industry with singers, actors, and comedians practically indistinguishable from their American counterparts.
Consistently stays just below cultural radar yet never quite disappears.
Parliamentary government and common-law judiciary appear to function acceptably yet remain completely inscrutable.
Never had a “disco phase.”
Seemingly endless supply of timber, donuts, and Scotch-plaid hats with earflaps.
Keeps insisting it “has no designs on America” and “only wants peace.”
Plays a mean game of pond hockey.
(via)
click image for interactive map
via cnnmoney.com
