• Billionaires Darwin Deason, Michael Dell, and Tony Pritzker are trying to offload homes right now.
• Their properties for sale range from a $31 million penthouse in Boston to a $195 million LA estate.
• It can take a long time for extremely expensive or unique homes to find buyers.

Billionaires regularly want to offload their homes, but the housing market can present some unique challenges for the wealthiest home sellers.

Buyers at high price points don't always love properties customized for the previous owner, and the additional cost of maintenance and upkeep can deter even the deepest pockets. Some people struggling to rid themselves of luxurious properties end up slashing their asking prices. Others forego selling them altogether, choosing to either auction them off or rent them out instead.

At least two billionaires have found buyers for their homes this fall.

Gordon Getty, heir to the Getty fortune, found a buyer for his home near Berkeley, outside San Francisco, in less than a month. The 3,991-square-foot house, nicknamed the Temple of Wings, features Corinthian columns and luscious greenery, sold for $5.85 million in September after listing for $5 million in August.

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch's three-story, nearly 7,000-square-foot penthouse in Manhattan went into contract on October 10 after more than two years on the market, according to its listing. The former chair of Fox Corporation and News Corp. purchased it for $57.9 million in 2014. In 2022, he listed it for $62 million but dropped the price as low as $28.5 million — a 50% decrease.

A handful of billionaires, however, have homes they're still trying to sell.

Here's a roundup of billionaire-owned properties from Boston to California on the market as of January 6. They are presented in order of last name.

Venture capitalist Marc Andreessen listed his Bay Area mansion for $33 million in March 2024.

Earlier this year, tech investor Marc Andreessen and his wife Laura Arrillaga-Andreessen listed their $33 million Bay Area mansion.

Touted as ideal for hosts of events and parties, the five-bedroom, four-bathroom home has seven fireplaces, two separate kitchens ready for catering, and custom built-ins throughout to display art. It is located in Atherton, California, near Palo Alto and Stanford, and across the street from the Menlo Circus Club, an exclusive social club.

The Andreessens may not be leaving California altogether, however. The couple has purchased over $250 million worth of real estate in Malibu, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Of the three homes they have acquired over two years in the coastal enclave northeast of LA, the most expensive is a $177 million, seven-acre estate in Malibu's Paradise Cove neighborhood. Known for its picturesque shores that locals fiercely guard, Paradise Cove was once dubbed "the most unfriendly-to-the-public public beach in Southern California," according to San Francisco publication SFGate.

Andreessen's net worth as of January is $1.9 billion, according to Forbes.

Tech mogul Darwin Deason is parting ways with his Versailles-inspired estate in California.

Tech billionaire Darwin Deason has put his oceanfront estate in La Jolla, California, nicknamed the Sand Castle, on the market for an impressive $108 million.

Deason, who sold his IT and business process outsourcing company Affiliated Computer Services to Xerox for $6.4 billion in 2009, initially spent about $26 million on the house and an adjacent parcel of land, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Over about six years, Deason poured an additional $60 million into transforming the property into a breathtaking 13,000-square-foot mansion, drawing inspiration from Versailles and the Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc, a five-star retreat for celebrities in the South of France.

The estate includes a seven-bedroom main house and a three-bedroom guest house, with 14 full bathrooms and three half-bathrooms. It also features a pool, two cabanas, a fitness center, and an elevated, private beach with sand Deason imported from the Augusta, Georgia, golf course where the famed Masters tournament is played.

If the property sells even near its listing price, it will more than double the San Diego County record of $44.1 million set by billionaire Egon Durban in 2023.

Deason is worth $1.3 billion as of January, according to Forbes.

Michael Dell is trying to offload not one but two luxury penthouses in Boston.

Dell Technologies Chairman and CEO Michael Dell is no stranger to eye-popping real estate.

In 2015, he was the buyer of what was then the most expensive home ever sold in New York City, a $100 million penthouse overlooking Central Park on West 57th Street, aka Billionaires' Row. He raised his kids in a sprawling 33,000-square-foot Austin compound dubbed "The Castle" that featured both indoor and outdoor pools.

As of January, Dell's net worth was $119.6 billion, according to Forbes.

Now Dell is looking to unload two Boston properties he bought in 2020.

The first is a penthouse in Boston's tallest residential tower, One Dalton, which is one of the Four Seasons' private residences. The ultra-luxe home comes complete with 24-hour white-glove concierge service and a 570-square-foot private balcony. Originally listed at $34 million, the price has been reduced to $31 million as of October.

Dell's second Boston property for sale is a $9.45 million penthouse on the 54th floor of Boston's Millennium Tower, located just steps from the iconic Boston Commons park. This property features floor-to-ceiling windows with panoramic views of the city and the Charles River.

Hedge fund manager and billionaire Ken Griffin is exiting Chicago by selling his multiple condos

Ken Griffin, who founded Citadel, a hedge fund that manages $92.46 billion in total assets as of September 2023, is offloading a few condos in Chicago.

Griffin famously relocated his managing firm to Florida in 2022. He also set himself up pretty nicely by spending about $169 million on properties in one neighborhood between 2020 and 2023. He also bought two bay front houses in Coconut Grove in 2022.

He's seemingly all in on Florida, but still has some loose ends to clean up in the Midwest.

Griffin bought a Chicago penthouse and three other units for $59 million in 2017 in what is still the city's biggest real-estate deal.

Records show he bought the top two floors, totaling about 15,000 square feet, for $34 million. The units are the top two floors of the No. 9 Walton building and are unfinished. Griffin has never lived in them.

In November, he sold those units for $19 million, taking a 44% loss on the sale. He's not quite yet done as the other two units he owns are still for sale.

According to Forbes, Griffin's net worth is $45.9 billion as of January.

Joe Lacob, who owns the Golden State Warriors, put his Malibu mansion on the market in August.

The owner of the Golden State Warriors basketball team, Joe Lacob, once claimed to be one of the best blackjack players in the world, winning $1 million in one sitting at least nine times.

Lacob must be hoping his luck hasn't run out as he tries to sell his Malibu mansion for $44 million.

The home on Carbon Beach has five bedrooms across about 5,500 square feet. It allows for indoor-outdoor living, with open balconies throughout to enjoy California's balmy climate.

It also has Hollywood-glam touches like a waterfall wall, a movie theater, and a glass-enclosed gym.

The third level is a prime entertaining space, complete with a barbecue island, a fire pit, a lounge area, and a hot tub.

Lacob does have a history of good bets. In 2010, he and other investors purchased the Golden State Warriors for $450 million. In July, the New York Post estimated the franchise's value to be $5.4 billion.

Lacob, a former venture capital investor, is worth $2.1 billion as of January, according to Forbes.

Hyatt Hotels heir Tony Pritzker is selling his enormous Los Angeles home after a bitter divorce.

Tony Pritzker, chairman and CEO of Pritzker Private Capital, built one of the country's largest and most luxurious homes.

Pritzker and his former wife Jeanne spent six years constructing a 50,000-square-foot megamansion in the hills of Beverly Crest, an upscale neighborhood in Los Angeles' Westside.

After their contentious divorce earlier this year, the home landed on the market in October for a staggering $195 million.

The estate has 16 bedrooms and 27 bathrooms over six acres. Amenities include a tennis court, a basketball court, a cliffside pool, a detached guest house, a bowling alley, and a private movie theater. The house's perch also offers stunning 180-degree views of the Los Angeles skyline.

The Wall Street Journal reported that if the Pritzker estate sells for its asking price of $195 million, it will set a record for the most expensive home sold in Los Angeles. This record is currently held by Jeff Bezos, who spent $165 million on the Warner Estate, located 1.4 miles away, in 2020.

According to Forbes, Pritzker, an heir to the Hyatt Hotels fortune, has a net worth of $4.1 billion as of January.

• Ryan Serhant's firm raised $45 million from Camber Creek and Left Lane Capital.
• Much of the money will go toward growing the firm's AI platform, S.mple.
• S.mple isn't Serhant's first app. He told BI how he turned past failures into success.

Despite Ryan Serhant's standout 2024, he hasn't escaped failure. After creating two apps that ultimately faltered, he's on to his third, raising millions to help catapult it to success.

In December, the real-estate mogul announced that his brokerage firm, Serhant, had raised $45 million in its first equity funding round from the capital firms Camber Creek and Left Lane Capital.

His firm, which he founded in 2020, also increased its year-over-year sales volume by over $1 billion, its annual letter said. In June, Serhant, who starred on Bravo's "Million Dollar Listing New York," debuted his own Netflix show, "Owning Manhattan," which was greenlighted for a second season.

Traditional brokerage firms aren't typically venture-backed. Serhant told Business Insider that much of the VC funding the firm raised would go toward growing its AI-powered app, S.mple.

As its name implies, S.mple is designed to simplify brokers' administrative work as independent contractors, allowing more time for selling real estate.

Serhant told CNBC last month that the firm's nearly 1,000 agents had been using the app, which launched last January, and that it had saved the firm more than the equivalent of 625 working days in admin time.

S.mple, available only to Serhant agents, allows agents to manage contracts, marketing materials, sales follow-ups, customer-relationship-management metrics, and more from their phones. It's designed to streamline those processes, taking over much of the administrative side of the work.

"It's Instacart for salespeople," Serhant told BI. "It's the least sexy part of what we do."

Contrary to the app's name, the road to launching it was far from simple. Two previous app ventures, Univers, a real-estate brokerage in the metaverse, and Spaces, a video-editing tool, failed to take off as Serhant hoped. But he wasn't deterred.

Serhant broke down his missteps for BI and explained how he learned from his mistakes.

Listen to what people are asking for, not what you imagine they need

In 2022, Serhant launched Univers, a headquarters for his namesake brokerage in the metaverse that allowed teams anywhere in the world to meet.

Its futuristic virtual office tower was populated with robots, agent avatars, and elevators that moved like spaceships.

It might've been eye-catching, but Serhant said agents didn't find it as useful as he had envisioned. Features like the ability to choose their avatars' hair color or wardrobe weren't helping agents close deals in the real world.

"It didn't actually solve any immediate problems for them," he said.

Serhant realized the same was true for Spaces, a video-editing app he created in 2022 to help sellers' agents design virtual tours and marketing materials.

Serhant saw the potential, but the agents did not. They were more likely to use existing apps and tools they were comfortable with.

"The biggest lesson was don't just give customers what you think they need," Serhant said. "A lot of times it's just about really asking and listening to direct feedback."

He added that the roadblocks Univers and Spaces faced helped him learn about the app-development world.

Serhant said that now he's comfortable interviewing engineers and developers and discussing how they develop models or use machine-learning technologies.

"I didn't know what to ask before," Serhant said. "I didn't know what I didn't know."

He said he persevered because he believes that making useful tech for real-estate agents is good business. He compared his app-development journey to a lawnmower that doesn't start immediately.

"You have to figure out how to get it going," Serhant said.

• Home prices across the US kept climbing in 2024, and luxury home prices were no exception.
• The cost of the top 5% of luxury homes rose nearly 9% from 2023 to 2024, Redfin found.
• A $210 million Malibu mansion and $108 million Aspen property were among the priciest sold in 2024.

By some measures, all home prices reached record highs in 2024.

It's not just more affordably priced homes that have gotten more expensive: Luxury real estate has also boomed this year.

The price of luxury homes — defined as those with a market value in the top 5% for their area — rose nearly 9% year-over-year as of the second quarter of 2024, according to the most recent data available from real-estate site Redfin. That jump was twice as fast as the increase for non-luxury homes, Redfin found.

Here's a look at five of the most expensive homes sold across the US this year.

A $210 million Malibu mansion broke California's record for priciest property ever sold

In June, Oakley sunglasses founder James Jannard sold his Malibu mansion for $210 million.

It edged out Beyoncé and Jay-Z's $200 million compound, also in Malibu, to break the record for the most expensive home ever sold in California.

Jannard bought the estate 12 years ago for $75 million, but the new owner's name is shrouded behind an anonymous LLC, the Los Angeles Times reported.

The mansion has eight bedrooms, 14 bathrooms, and a tennis court spread over 9.5 acres and was pared down by previous owners who found the original main home "too grandiose," according to San Francisco outlet SFGate.

Its renovation was handled by Michael S. Smith, who also redesigned the White House's Oval Office for then-President Barack Obama in 2010.

A home on Palm Beach's only private island sold for $152 million

In May, a 28,600-square-foot home on Tarpon Island in Palm Beach, Florida, sold for $152 million, a real-estate agent behind the sale confirmed to Business Insider.

The property — situated on Palm Beach's only private island — includes two private decks, multiple pools, a wine room, a waterfront gym, a tennis court, and a wellness facility complete with a massage room and a nail salon, according to Mansion Global.

The home's buyer was Australian investor Michael Dorrell, who founded infrastructure investment firm Stonepeak Partners and formerly served as a senior managing director at Blackstone, The Wall Street Journal first reported, citing people familiar with the deal.

Another Palm Beach home sold for $148 million to a collector of trophy properties

A nearly 23,000-square-foot house with 225 feet fronting the Atlantic Ocean in Palm Beach sold for $148 million to billionaire investor Daren Metropoulos earlier this year, Mansion Global reported.

Metropoulos — a principal at private-equity firm Metropoulos & Co. and former co-CEO of Pabst Brewing Company — is a collector of trophy properties. He purchased the former Playboy Mansion in Holmby Hills, California, in 2016 for $100 million, according to The New York Times.

The landmarked Mediterranean Revival-style house in Palm Beach, designed by architect Addison Mizner in 1919, is called Casa Amado and sits on 3.2 acres, according to Mansion Global.

A $135 million penthouse was New York City's most expensive sale of the year

Real-estate developer Vlad Doronin's highest-profile project of late is the hotel and condos at Aman New York, located in the landmarked Beaux-Arts-style Crown Building on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan.

Doronin himself purchased a five-story penthouse in the building this year for $135 million, Bloomberg reported.

The penthouse is one of just 22 residences above the hotel, which has more than 80 rooms, according to Bloomberg.

The home, which fetched more than $10,000 per square foot, was sold as an unfinished space that the owner can build out, Bloomberg reported, citing a spokesperson for developer OKO Group.

Doronin, who the Wall Street Journal called a "Russian James Bond" earlier this year, founded OKO Group and serves as Aman's owner, chairman, and CEO.

An Aspen home with 11 bedrooms broke a Colorado record

Former casino tycoon Steve Wynn partnered with billionaire financier Thomas Peterffy to purchase Colorado's most expensive home ever sold, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Looking out over Aspen at the base of Red Mountain, the 22,405-square-foot mansion — which includes 11 bedrooms, 17 bathrooms, an outdoor pool, and a guest house — sold to the pair in April for $108 million, The Denver Post reported.

Aspen's first nine-figure sale elevates it to the ranks of other places that have hit that milestone: New York, Los Angeles, and Palm Beach, according to the Journal.

• Real-estate tech startups aim to make tasks from property management to homebuying more efficient.
• We surveyed 10 venture capitalists to identify the hottest proptech companies of the year.
• Some of the firms are modernizing real estate by digitizing analog processes, sometimes using AI.

The frozen housing market meant tough times for the proptech — or property technology — industry.

As the market starts to thaw, however, things are looking up for firms that seek to use technology to digitize, automate, or otherwise improve legacy processes in the worlds of residential and commercial real estate.

Business Insider asked 10 venture-capital investors who focus on real-estate and construction technology to nominate the most exciting, promising, and talked-about proptech startups in 2024.

The 20 companies on the final list reveal the breadth of the proptech universe.

Take Steadily, a firm trying to digitize insurance underwriting for real-estate investors, a process that has historically taken a lot of paperwork and time — only to result in policies with steep premiums. Another startup, Arcol, aims to make producing 3D architectural drawings faster and easier. A third, Conservation Labs, uses an AI-powered sensor to detect if water is leaking or being wasted in a building to prevent damage and protect the environment.

In the first half of 2024, venture funding for proptech companies dropped 14.3% from the same period a year prior. Funding totaled $4.37 billion, down from $5.1 billion during the same period in 2023 and dramatically less than the $13.13 billion invested in the first six months of 2022, according to the Center for Real Estate Technology & Innovation (CRETI), which surveyed 1,088 proptech startups.

Certain niches, however, hold promise. In 2024, VC investments in AI-powered proptech companies reached a record $3.2 billion, CRETI reported earlier this month.

Here are 20 of the buzziest proptech companies in 2024, presented alphabetically. The companies' fundraising numbers are from PitchBook to ensure a consistent data source.

Did we miss a company you think is disrupting the industry? Send reporter Jordan Pandy an email at [email protected].

Agora

City: New York City and Tel Aviv

Year founded: 2019

Total funding: $64.31 million

What it does: Agora is a financial software firm that helps real-estate investors process payments, keep track of tax records, raise money, and generally organize data.

Why it's hot: The firm, which raised a $34 million Series B round in May, said it helps landlords and developers with much-needed modernization.

"Real estate is the largest asset class in the world. However, the market still relies on legacy software providers, inefficient workflows, outdated, fragmented systems, and manual, tedious work," Asaf Raz, Agora's head of marketing, told Business Insider.

"Investors expect a digital-first experience — they're tech-savvy and need access to information quickly. Firms can't work without it, and clients need a platform like Agora more than ever," Raz said.

A challenge it faces: Real-estate investors are still grappling with relatively high interest rates, which makes it harder to borrow money and scale up, and the relatively high price of materials, which makes it tougher to renovate or upgrade properties. Those market forces could make customers more reluctant to spend money on new software.

Agora CEO Bar Mor told business news site Pulse 2.0 earlier this month, however, that Agora might still appeal to customers because its suite of products could help them "enhance efficiency and save costs."

Arcol

City: New York

Year founded: 2021

Total funding: $5.1 million

What it does: Arcol is a web browser-based design tool predominantly used by architects to create and collaborate on 3D models of buildings and explore their feasibility.

Why it's hot: Architects — Arcol's target audience — have traditionally relied on software design tools like AutoCAD and Revit, which require paid licenses and aren't as collaborative. Arcol has set out to solve that issue with a browser-based format easily shared and edited by anyone involved in a building project.

"These people are core to our society; they're literally building the built world, yet they hate using their tools," said Paul O'Carroll, the son of an architect and founder of Arcol. "The design tool we use to design buildings, we want to rethink for the browser to be collaborative and to be performant."

So far, demand is high. Arcol, run by a team of six, has a waitlist of over 18,000 users, O'Carroll said.

A challenge it faces: There are several other startups in the BIM, or Business Information Modeling, space. Competing with established players like Revit could take a lot of time and money, according to AEC Magazine. (AEC stands for architecture, engineering, and construction.)

Also, Arcol is currently only useful to architects during the conceptual modeling phase, and the company hopes to expand the tool to help with other stages of construction.

Branch Furniture

City: New York City

Year founded: 2018

Total funding: $11.76 million

What it does: Branch Furniture sells office products, like chairs and desks, to businesses and directly to consumers.

Why it's hot: The company's first iteration sold office furniture the old way: B2B, catering to employers outfitting a huge space who would often purchase items in bulk. After the pandemic changed how (and how often) workers occupied offices, Branch pivoted to sell to regular people — wherever they work.

"We launched our D2C business to cater to the future of work, which was definitively hybrid, both during COVID and after — and that's where we sit today," Sib Mahapatra, cofounder of Branch Furniture, told Business Insider.

Branch's ergonomic chair is a bestseller with a 4.6 rating out of five with over 6,000 reviews — it's rated among the best in its category by Business Insider, Architectural Digest, and Wired for its adjustability and sleek design.

In addition to desk chairs — in colors that range from a standard black to salmon-y orange hue called "poppy," the company also sells desks and lamps to outfit a home office. Its inventory includes meeting tables and even phone booths ($6,395) for more commercial office spaces.

A challenge it faces: Branch's products are physical, so it's been plagued by supply-chain delays. Branch is also up against competitors in the good-looking-furniture-that-is-also-comfortable arena, including Herman Miller and Steelcase — though Branch's offerings are often cheaper.

The company is also gaining ground regarding velocity, or the speed at which new products are developed and released.

"We're learning a lot about the pace of iteration in our product category," Mahapatra said. "It's definitely not software, but the benefit is that you get more time to really get things right and to iterate with purpose, and you end up being a little bit more deliberate about how you iterate the product — it just takes longer."

BuildCasa

City: Oakland, California

Year founded: 2022

Total funding: $6.67 million

What it does: BuildCasa helps California homeowners subdivide their lots — thanks to new state laws — and then connects them with local builders who pay the homeowners for a portion of their land and then build new housing on it.

Why it's hot: The national housing crisis is particularly acute in California, which recently passed a series of laws to encourage more building. While others look to transform construction to make cheaper housing, BuildCasa uses technology instead to find more buildable lots in desirable locations like San Francisco and San Jose.

Most massive home-building companies focus on large, master-planned communities, often far from city centers. BuildCasa's vision, said its founders Ben Bear, CEO, and Paul Stiedl, CPO, is to become a large homebuilder focused instead on finding land in already desirable cities and suburbs.

The company works with homeowners to subdivide their land, creating a new, buildable lot. Those lots can then be sold to a local real-estate developer to build on, or BuildCasa can work in partnership with a local builder to erect and then sell a completed home.

A challenge it faces: New laws have simplified the process of subdividing lots, but building in infill areas still requires technical expertise and good relationships with local officials. Building on these smaller lots may be becoming easier, but it still isn't easy.

Conservation Labs

City: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Year founded: 2018

Total funding: $14.68 million

What it does: Conservation Labs developed a smart water sensor that can identify leaks and wasteful water use. The H2know sensor uses machine learning to decode sounds in water pipes and translate them into insights for commercial property owners, including restaurants and hotels.

Why it's hot: The startup is at the intersection of two buzzy topics: AI and sustainability. H2know trains on thousands of hours of water pipe acoustics so that, over time, it becomes more accurate in detecting leaks and inefficient water use in buildings. Customers use that information to fix problems and conserve water, saving them money on utility bills while lowering their overall carbon footprint. Some 20% of home energy use goes to heating water.

"There's a very strong relationship between net-zero carbon emissions and water consumption," said Mark Kovscek, founder and CEO of Conservation Labs.

He added that H2know has detected leaky toilets in nearly every building in which it's installed. Some large properties are wasting 1 million gallons of water a year, he said.

A challenge it faces: H2know starts at $129, and it could be hard to convince cash-strapped commercial real estate owners to spend money to install sensors when the office market is struggling in many parts of the US.

Kovscek said the goal is to scale up to 100,000 sensors installed as soon as possible, or five times what Conservation Labs is currently on track to sell this year. To support that growth, the company needs to hire some of the "best and brightest" data scientists and engineers to further develop the machine-learning platform that underpins H2know, Kovscek said.

Constrafor

City: New York

Year founded: 2019

Total funding: Almost $380 million

What it does: Large general contractors use Constrafor's software to onboard and pay their subcontractors on time — sometimes before the contractors themselves get paid by the clients. Contractors can also use the software to help purchase the supplies and services needed to complete a construction project on time and within budget.

Why it's hot: There's the money raised. In November, Constrafor announced that it raised $14 million in Series A funding as well as a $250 million credit facility.

The issues the firm is trying to address are also key. Construction is booming across the US, thanks in part to President Joe Biden's $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill. The rise of AI is also leading to a corresponding increase in the construction of data centers.

The actual process of construction, however, can often be long and complicated. That's why Constrafor's role as a one-stop shop appeals to large general contractors.

"So far, everyone has been focused on just building a very, very small point solution," said Anwar Ghauche, Constrafor's founder. "We're combining multiple different workflows, multiple different departments, all on the same platform."

The main challenges it faces: Next up: Constrafor must try to convince subcontractors to subscribe and pay for its software, too.

Gauch added that Constrafor's contractor clients can face cash-flow crunches. Those can lead to delays on important projects.

After Hurricanes Helene and Milton severely damaged parts of Florida, North Carolina, and other parts of the Southeast, Constrafor launched a disaster relief effort that would allow local contractors who are part of rebuilding efforts "to overcome delays, purchase materials, and ensure timely payment for their teams."

Ease Capital

City: New York

Year founded: 2022

Total funding: $13.95 million

What it does: Ease Capital helps private equity firms and large investors lend to smaller apartment landlords. It uses data and technology that allow the biggest players to lend $5 million to $50 million in deals that would typically be too small for them.

Why it's hot: Sophisticated private lenders usually focus on the largest apartment complexes, meaning that most apartment-building owners have to turn to banks and agencies to borrow money to purchase or refinance properties. However, current high rates have dramatically slowed bank and agency lending and the large private lenders usually won't lend for small—and medium-sized projects.

Ease uses data and technology to make it easier and more efficient for these large lenders to lend on smaller deals when the need is the highest. In 2023, the company announced a $450 million partnership with major real estate owner and asset manager Taconic Capital Partners, and has already announced multiple successfully originated loans.

CEO Charlie Oshamn told Business Insider earlier this year that the company is often seeing up to $1 billion in loan requests a month. Unlike other firms, which provide an estimated rate upfront that could potentially change over months of negotiation, Ease Capital sticks to its initial offering, eliminating the guessing game for potential clients.

A challenge it faces: Though the founding team has successfully launched other major proptech businesses, like flexible office and event space provider Convene and real-estate data firm Reonomy, it still needs to prove itself as a lender.

Habi

City: Colombia and Mexico

Year founded: 2019

Total funding: $564 million

What it does: Habi has built Latin America's largest proprietary database and utilizes AI-based pricing algorithms to facilitate transactions and financing for homebuyers and sellers. Habi also buys and sells homes, offers mortgages, and posts and publicizes listings of properties for sale.

Why it's hot: The company operates in Colombia and Mexico without centralized MLS. MLS, or multiple listing services, are databases designed to help real estate brokers identify available homes for sale. These systems are abundant in the US, whereas they are scarce in Latin America. Without an MLS, it means homebuyers and sellers in Colombia and Mexico have difficulty knowing which properties are available for sale, their prices, and their listing and pricing history.

By gathering and sharing information on more than 20 million homes, Habi has addressed a critical need in these countries' real estate sector, establishing itself as an authority on housing in the region.

"We've become a household name for low and middle-income sellers and consumers and brokers in Mexico and Colombia," Brynne McNulty Rojas, CEO and cofounder of Habi, told Business Insider.

A challenge it faces: A combination of factors, including shifting economic and political conditions, has stalled the growth of Latin America's real-estate market. To achieve the same level of ubiquity as Zillow in the US, Habi must get real-estate brokers and sellers to list their properties on its platform and entice buyers to use it.

HoneyHomes

City: Lafayette, California

Year founded: 2021

Total funding: $21.35 million

What it does: Founder Vishwas Prabhakara envisions Honey Homes as a "primary care physician for your home." For a monthly fee, a dedicated handyman will come once or twice a month to knock off "lightweight" home improvement projects like fixing a leaky faucet, installing a new ceiling fan, or repainting a room.

Why it's hot: With a cooling housing market, Prabhakara believes many homeowners are staying in their homes longer and interested in investing resources in — and enjoying — the property they currently have.

The main challenge it faces: Homeowners who already hire their preferred handymen may not be willing to pay for a service that sends new people, and bigger projects might require more specialized repair professionals. Then there's the cost and current smaller scale of the company: Subscriptions start from $295 a month, or $3,940 a year, according to the company website. The service is only available in parts of San Francisco and the Bay Area, Los Angeles, Orange County, and Dallas, according to the site.

Impulse Labs

City: San Francisco

Year founded: 2021

Total funding: $25 million

What it does: Impulse Labs made a battery-powered induction cooktop that, unlike most of its competitors, which may require an electrical upgrade, can plug into a standard 120-volt outlet. The cooktop can boil water at lightning speeds, and sensors hold heat levels steady even at high temperatures.

Why it's hot: Impulse Labs founder Sam D'Amico said the cooktop offers a better cooking experience than gas burners while promoting more climate-friendly homes. Cooking with gas emits pollutants like methane, benzene, and carbon monoxide, which harm our health and the planet. But it can cost thousands of dollars to rewire a home for an electric induction stove. Impulse Labs' induction cooktop avoids those pollutants and the cost of home retrofits.

The battery in Impulse Labs' stove also stores enough power to make three meals if the power goes out, D'Amico said.

"One of the cheapest ways to deploy battery storage is in the appliances we have to buy anyways," he added.

The main challenge it faces: The cooktop costs $5,999. The price is high, D'Amico said, but similar to other premium appliances. The price is lower if buyers qualify for tax breaks and rebates from federal and state governments, as well as some utilities. It's also only a cooktop — not a full stove — but D'Amico said the company eventually wants to sell a suite of appliances that can be a whole-home battery solution. Impulse Labs is accepting pre-orders, with plans to ship in the first quarter of 2025, according to its website.

Keyway

City: New York City

Year founded: 2020

Total funding: $43 million

What it does: Keyway uses machine learning and AI to aid institutional investors in sourcing, underwriting, and managing portfolios of properties.

Why it's hot: Companies that use AI have become commonplace today, but Keyway believes it is ahead of the pack in adopting and applying AI technology to real-estate investing.

"We were very early on in the AI game in 2020, and I think we've built a really strong backend of data with lots of APIs that allows us to integrate very segregated data very fast," CEO and cofounder Matias Recchia told Business Insider. "The fact that we built our system in a modular way also allows us to customize our product to a lot of our customers — so it's really not one solution fits all."

The main challenge it faces: New technology like Keyway can be hard to push on seasoned real-estate investors as they're used to using old-school methods like manually sourcing, underwriting, and managing portfolios.

"We're merging two cultures that are very different," Recchia said. "The real-estate industry requires a lot of proof to show them that data can really help them make better decisions. So there's a little bit of a culture shift that we're bringing to real estate as we sell them these tools and we partner with them."

Latii

City: Brooklyn, New York

Year founded: 2023

Total funding: $8.82 million

What it does: Latii is a sourcing platform that uses AI-powered tools to help North American-based architects and contractors save up to 60% by connecting with Latin American, southern European, and northern African window and door fabricators.

Why it's hot: Architects often include custom windows and doors in their designs, but hiring contractors and craftspeople overseas can cost their property-owning clients thousands of dollars. The architects who work with Latii, however, can source materials faster and at lower costs, cofounder and CEO Santiago Bueno told Business Insider.

"We're able to produce either equal or higher quality products at a less expensive rate," Bueno said.

In October, Latti announced that it had raised $5 million in seed-round funding, which it will use to expand in the Pacific Northwest, Mountain states, and the New York tri-state area.

The main challenge it faces: When working with fabricators in Latin America, challenges can arise in managing certifications, enforcing warranties, and overcoming language barriers. The region's use of the metric system can also be difficult for North America-based architects to navigate.

Lessen

City: Scottsdale, Arizona

Year founded: 2020

Total funding: $713.8 million

What it does: Lessen's software allows commercial and residential landlords to track maintenance needs, connect with service providers, and buy products.

Why it's hot: In August, Inc. magazine named Lessen the fastest-growing private software company in the US, citing its $1.1 billion valuation.

The valuation preceded a major acquisition in 2023: Lessen spent $950 million to buy property maintenance management firm SMS Assist in what the Commercial Observer called the largest proptech acquisition in history.

Lessen's software is widely used, handling 3 million work orders a year across 250,000 properties, according to Fifth Wall, an investor in the firm. Lessen also launched Lessen Advantage Marketplace, which allows its landlord customers to buy materials like glass, floors, and doors and find better insurance and loan rates.

The main challenge it faces: Like many real-estate firms, Lessen faces an overall slowdown in both the commercial and residential sectors, with mortgage rates remaining elevated. One big potential client base for Lessen is office building owners and property managers, but the office market right now is struggling, with vacancies around the US at record highs.

"We typically grow hand-in-hand with our clients, serving them in additional properties and markets as they expand. So, for example, interest rates can influence growth in some areas of our business," said Michael Tanner, senior vice president of marketing at Lessen.

A dearth of tradespeople is also a challenge for the company's platform that connects them to landlords, Tanner said.

Finally, the firm competes in a crowded market of competitors offering software for landlords, including Stessa, AppFolio, TenantCloud, and more.

Metropolis

City: Santa Monica

Year founded: 2017

Total funding raised by the company: $1.93 billion

What it does: Metropolis uses a computer vision platform powered by artificial intelligence to enable checkout-free payment at parking facilities. After registering their vehicles on the Metropolis app, customers can simply drive in and drive out without the hassle of paying with credit cards or ticket machines.

Why it's hot: Metropolis announced its acquisition of SP Plus, the largest parking network in North America, for $1.5 billion in October 2023 and closed the deal in May 2024. The move allowed Metropolis to rapidly scale its technology and reach 50 million customers across 4,000 locations.

"We've seen success and are continuing to scale and grow because Metropolis' checkout-free experiences give people the gift of time back, so they can spend it on the things that matter the most," cofounder and CEO Alex Israel told Business Insider.

The main challenge it faces: Israel said that most of the parking payments and transactions in the world are still analog.

"We envision a future where checkout-free payments travel with you, but scaling this technology across industries is complicated — it requires remarkable proprietary technology and boots on the ground," he said.

PredictAP

City: Boston

Year founded: 2020

Total funding: $13.17 million

What it does: PredictAP makes real estate invoice processing simple and easy. It uses AI to code invoices quickly.

"So the accounting rules can become very complicated in commercial real estate at big companies," said CEO and founder David Stifter, describing the journey of how an invoice is processed.

He said an invoice would come in first, and someone would need to determine which accounting rules to apply. Predict AP will be useful at this stage because the AI will understand and use the accounting rules correctly. Then, it will go through the rest of the accounts payable process, a department responsible for paying vendors for services or goods at the company. Then, someone will approve it and then pay for it.

Why it's hot: Predict AP serves every corner of the real estate sector. The company said its customers are publicly traded companies that own real estate, private companies that own and operate real estate, or customers who provide services for those big companies.

The company has been able to help AP specialists and property managers face difficulties entering invoices because it takes a lot of time and effort.

"We're able to help folks with that difficult task of coding invoices and it's particularly painful in real estate where there's a lot of complexity," said CEO and founder David Stifter. He added: "Nobody wants to be typing 15-digit invoice numbers; that's not fun."

Russell Franks, the president and cofounder of Predict AP, added to his comments and noted that Predict AP could process an invoice in 30 to 40 seconds faster than the normal processing time of five to 10 minutes.

The main challenge it faces: The company shared that it is hard to find funding in this tough economy, and it is not easy to grow and expand.

Propexo

City: Boston

Year Founded: 2022

Total funding: $7.97 million

What it does: Propexo's unified API, or application programming interface, helps other real-estate tech companies quickly and easily integrate with property-management systems.

Why it's hot: Real-estate tech companies use APIs to integrate with data from external sources, like lead generation systems or rent roll systems.

However, existing APIs and the technology around them are outdated.

That means companies lose time and money that could be used to develop their product while trying to integrate with these APIs, said COO Ben Keller.

Propexo's unified API improves the developer experience by making the integration process simpler, faster, and cheaper. "We're really the first engineering infrastructure product in the proptech ecosystem," said Keller.

The main challenge it faces: It's not easy to convince property managers and owner-operators to change how they've been running their businesses for many years.

In August, the Department of Justice filed an antitrust lawsuit against RealPage, alleging that the property-management software company allows landlords to coordinate and unfairly keep rents high. This is causing some landlords to rethink how they handle and process information, according to trade publication Multifamily Dive.

Rent Butter

City: Chicago

Year founded: 2020

Total funding: $4 million

What it does: Rent Butter has created an alternative tenant screening process that gives landlords a more comprehensive view of applicants' financial history.

Why it's hot: Landlords have historically relied on static credit reports and background checks when evaluating potential tenants. Doing so creates a barrier for applicants with financial difficulties early in their adult lives, as credit scores are a difficult metric to improve.

Rent Butter is trying to eliminate that barrier and change the narrative around who is a "good" candidate by providing landlords with additional information that can more accurately assess a person's financial reliability.

Their application connects to an applicant's bank account, credit history, and employment, criminal, and rent payment history to provide a detailed one-page report highlighting their financial behaviors and potential risks.

"Our whole approach is: How do we show who the person is today — not who they were seven or 10 years ago," cofounder and CTO Christopher Rankin told Business Insider.

The main challenge it faces: Rent Butter partners with landlords, rather than selling directly to consumers, which makes scaling a challenge. Most landlords already have a tenant-vetting process, so it could be hard to convince them to change to Rent Butter.

Shepherd

City: San Francisco

Year founded: 2021

Total funding: $22.27 million

What it does: Shepherd is a Managing General Underwriter (MGU) leveraging tech to make underwriting commercial construction insurance more efficient. It also wields data to create more informed risk selection and price recommendations, often leading to upfront and long-term savings for policyholders.

Why it's hot: Insurers partner with MGUs to provide clients with insurance, with the MGU underwriting policies for clients and selling to potential policyholders. Shepherd adapts the typical MGU model by cutting the underwriting process from weeks to hours and incorporating risk assessment tech into its platform, making it a one-stop shop for insurers and clients. By working faster and putting these services in one place, Shepherd can better serve construction companies and insurers while fostering more involved relationships.

The main challenges it faces: Both insurance brokers and potential clients have some healthy skepticism about a new model for commercial construction insurance, so it falls on Shepherd to earn their trust to gain their business.

Steadily

City: Austin

Year founded: 2020

Total funding: $60.1 million

What it does: Steadily is a digital insurance company for real-estate investors that promises a "faster, better, and cheaper" underwriting experience.

Why it's hot: Steadily founder Darren Nix first encountered the outdated nature of insurance underwriting, trying to find quotes for his own rental property in Chicago.

Terrible customer service and shockingly high quotes stopped him in his tracks.

"It was like rolling back the clock to the mid-1990s," he told Business Insider. Focusing on selling insurance to real-estate investors has helped Steadily grow to about 140 employees across Austin and Kansas City, Missouri.

In November, Steadily announced it had started to actively write new business on its own insurance carrier. "Nothing says 'we believe in the product we've built' more strongly than underwriting risk as the carrier," Nix said in a statement.

The main challenge it faces: Steadily has started selling insurance to short-term-rental investors, which presents different challenges than underwriting more traditional, longer-term rentals.

The market represents significant growth — accounting for nearly 20% of Steadily's current business — but the pricing is tricker.

"The people coming in and out of those properties don't take care of them at the same level of responsibility," Nix explained. "One of the things that a host can do to demonstrate that they are a good insurance risk is to point to their Airbnb or VRBO history and show that they're a super host, they take great care of their property, they don't host ragers."

Tour24

City: Medfield, Massachusetts

Year founded: 2020

Total funding: $20.35 million

What it does: Tour24 is an app that lets prospective tenants take self-guided apartment tours without a leasing agent present.

Why it's hot: In many cities, renting an apartment can be cutthroat, with open-house lines and bidding wars to nab a good unit at a reasonable price.

More than ever, people are deciding on places to live quickly — sometimes even committing before they've even seen the unit because they aren't able to schedule a walkthrough that jives with their working hours.

Tour24 allows users — who are ID- and credit card-verified — to tour apartments when leasing agents aren't available, such as on evenings and weekends.

"We are seeing that certainly millennials really prefer self-guided experience," Georgianna W. Oliver, the founder of Tour24, told Business Insider.

Oliver said many of their leasing-agency clients offer Tour24's self-guided tours as well as leasing agent-led tours and virtual tours — and have given feedback that the more options they give potential renters, the better.

"People have the options," she said. "And they really like having the options."

The main challenge it faces: Since the worst part of the COVID-19 pandemic, many individual leasing agencies have been offering some version of a self-guided tour on their own with their own video Tour24 also competes with other self-guided rental-tour apps like Rently and CareTaker.

Tour24 seems to be holding its own: The startup announced in October that it raised $5 million in a Series B round, noting that it had doubled in size in 2024 to reach 525,000 units across over 2,060 multifamily properties.

• Prosecutors accused luxury real-estate agents Oren and Tal Alexander of sex trafficking this month.
• They are the latest in a series of top figures in real estate accused of sexual abuse or harassment.
• Some in the industry say its structure, partying, and cult of personality are all partly to blame.

The Alexander brothers, luxury brokers who New York prosecutors accused of sex trafficking this month, are the latest in a series of top figures in real estate accused of sexual abuse or harassment.

The brothers, Oren and Tal, have denied the allegations.

Still, the accusations have made some in the industry — which is dominated by women but mostly led by men — reflect on its permissive, decentralized culture that parties hard and, too often, multiple people told Business Insider, puts women into uncomfortable or dangerous situations.

While it's far from a mass reckoning like Hollywood's #MeToo movement, the series of accusations against major real estate players over the past year and a half has prompted some in the industry to look inward and consider whether its traditional practices and lack of uniform safety precautions may have contributed.

Sue Yannaccone, the president and CEO of Anywhere Real Estate Inc., which owns multiple real-estate-brokerage chains, including Century21, Coldwell Banker, and Corcoran, told Business Insider that real estate has more to do to address some of these issues.

"Real estate is not unlike other industries that have had to, unfortunately, reckon with a pattern of discrimination and harassment of women," Yannaccone said. "Holding offenders accountable is an important and effective step in our progress, and there is still more work to be done across all sectors to ensure women can always thrive in safe, supportive, and equitable work environments."

The lax structure and low barrier to entry in real estate often mean careers are built largely on an individual agent's personality and charisma. It can also create opportunities for bad behavior to go unchecked, said Brian Boero, the cofounder of 1000watt, a real-estate branding and marketing company.

With over 1.5 million agents or brokers in the United States, it's similar to "the Wild West," he said. He added that many of them operate as independent contractors, acting as free agents.

"You have really good people, and you have really bad people. It's hard to paint this industry as a whole with a broad brush," Boero said. "The employee relationship does not exist, and people can, more or less, do whatever they want with very little supervision."

A series of accusations

Oren and Tal Alexander first rose to prominence as real-estate agents at Douglas Elliman before splitting off to found their own brokerage, Official Partners.

The Alexander Team, as they were commonly known, sold over $260 million in real estate in New York in 2023, the real-estate industry trade publication The Real Deal reported.

The Alexanders "used their prominent positions in the industry to induce other women to attend events and parties" where they later sexually assaulted them, prosecutors said in an indictment earlier this month.

Prosecutors accused Oren, Tal, and a third brother Alon, who works at the family's security firm, of operating a sex-trafficking scheme in which the brothers — and others — victimized dozens of women dating back to 2010. The brothers obtained drugs to "surreptitiously" give the women and planned the assaults in advance, prosecutors said in the indictment.

Attorneys for the three brothers, whom police arrested in Florida earlier this month, did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider. The twins denied the allegations when they were first reported.

James Cinque, a New York attorney representing the Alexander brothers, told BI in response to a story published before their arrest outlining four women's claims of assault and sexual misconduct that he and his colleagues had "asked them not to comment while these matters work their way through the legal system." Cinque added they're "comfortable that they will ultimately be vindicated."

Meanwhile, the success of eXp, an emerging real-estate brokerage that has a market cap of about $1.8 billion, has been overshadowed by complaints of sexual misconduct against some of its agents.

Five female eXp employees, in two separate lawsuits filed in 2023, accused agents Michael Bjorkman and David Golden of drugging them at work-related events. Four of the women said they were also sexually assaulted, according to the lawsuits. The New York Times first reported the cases against Bjorkman and Golden.

Richard Schonfeld, an attorney representing Bjorkman, told BI that the lawsuits are "one side of the story." Peter Levine, a lawyer for Golden, didn't return requests for comment from BI but told the Times the charges against Golden were "baseless and without merit." Trial dates for both cases are set for 2025.

Representatives for eXp, who didn't return requests for comment from BI, emailed a statement to the Times, highlighting the industry's decentralized nature.

"The claims in this case stem from alleged assaults by independent real estate agents who were never eXp employees — which we handled with speed, seriousness, and deep respect as soon as the accusers brought it to our attention, in line with our values and with the law," it read.

The National Association of Realtors, the largest trade association for real-estate agents in the United States with more than 1.5 million members, is also facing troubling allegations.

One of the most notable involves Kenny Parcell, a Utah real-estate agent and former NAR president who resigned in August 2023 after The New York Times published an exposé detailing multiple accusations against him and the organization.

The Times' report was based on interviews with 29 current and former employees from NAR and its affiliates who said Parcell and other NAR and affiliated company leaders repeatedly engaged in abusive and inappropriate behavior, often without facing consequences.

In June 2023, Janelle Brevard filed a lawsuit against NAR, accusing the organization of sexual harassment, retaliation, and racial discrimination. In the lawsuit, Brevard, a Black woman, said she was fired from her role in podcasts, video, and marketing after ending a consensual relationship with Parcell.

Brevard ultimately withdrew her lawsuit after entering into an agreement with the organization, the Times reported. Brevard did not respond to repeated requests for comment from BI, and her attorney declined to comment.

"The allegations are not true," Parcell said in a four-page statement in 2023. "Nothing has changed" since then, he wrote in an email to Bl on December 23. "My resignation from NAR was in no way an admission of guilt — it was a good faith effort to put NAR and its members first," he said.

In response to a request for comment, a spokesperson for NAR said the organization's "new leadership has undertaken a comprehensive review of our policies and procedures and continues to work every day to help NAR employees feel respected and supported."

Parties, star-agent culture, and a long road ahead

The real-estate industry can feel unsafe at times, especially for women, as the job has inherent risks. Agents are commonly expected to meet with clients, who might be strangers, alone at homes that could be secluded or lack cell reception.

In a NAR survey of 1,423 licensed real-estate agents this year, women agents were twice as likely as men to report experiencing a situation at work that made them fear for their safety, and 54% of women carried a weapon or self-defense tool compared to 47% of men.

Still, Boero said the industry's internal culture — its hard-partying traditions and the "cult of the superstar" — also presented problems.

"The Alexander brothers were like that: high-profile, flashy, wealthy, did a ton of business. We tend to elevate, emulate, and worship those types of figures in this business. And they're not always men, but they frequently are," he said. "There is this cult of the top producer in the business that, I think, has maybe obscured bad behavior over the years."

Parties are also a central, sometimes problematic, component of real-estate culture. In an industry where success is often tied to how connected you are, brokers often frequent social events to meet and mingle with other brokers, current clients, and prospective clients.

"Parties and awards and all of that stuff is very big in this business, which means there's a lot of partying and drinking, sometimes at scale," Boero said, "which, again, sometimes creates the conditions within which bad people can do bad things."

Brooke Cohen, one of the attorneys representing all five plaintiffs in the eXp cases, told BI that socializing is often essential in real estate as an opportunity for making deals, networking, and advancing your career.

That means women can find themselves in uncomfortable environments. "It's important that in this industry some parameters are put in place," Cohen said. "We really would like it to be better for people who have to attend these events to do business."

Yannaccone said women's prevalence in the industry motivated her to create What Moves Her, a program that supports women in real-estate leadership.

"Our work is just one piece of a larger effort toward progress that includes not just the many brave voices of female agents and leaders, but many of our male counterparts as well," she said. "It's our hope that through our collective effort, we can help create an industry that truly operates on shared values of integrity, accountability, and good governance."

• Podcast host Ilana Dunn gives daters advice on her podcast "Seeing Other People."
• She guides her listeners through transforming their dating app profiles, charging $95 apiece.
• She shared three tips to make dating profiles better, including how to choose photos.

Ilana Dunn knows dating — and she agrees that it's tough out there.

Dunn, 30, used to be the lead content creator for Hinge, a dating app with about 20 million users. Now, she hosts the podcast "Seeing Other People," which is about dating in the digital age. It recently hit 5 million downloads and has over 400 episodes.

Its popularity comes as singles complain of "swipe fatigue," a disillusionment with online dating apps that has caused headaches for Bumble and Match Group, which owns Tinder and Hinge, and created a rush of new dating-app startups.

Dunn told Business Insider that she sympathizes with modern daters, who have the daunting task of crafting digital personas.

"Dating apps appeared one day, and they never came with an instruction manual," Dunn said.

There's hope, she added: Some simple tweaks to online dating profiles can help boost the chances of better matches.

In recent years, fans of her podcast have reached out for help with their profiles. Dunn began charging $95 to revamp them, helping clients select the best photos and prompts and curate how they share the story of who they are.

Dunn shared her top three tips to improve any dating profile.

1. Choose photos that show you doing what you love

Dunn said some daters fall prey to an obvious impulse — they only select photos in which they think they look the best.

"They're just posting the most attractive pictures of themselves, or what they think somebody would be attracted to," she said.

It can end up looking like a random, bland collection of images, Dunn warned.

Instead, Dunn recommended finding photos that more effectively reflect one's interests and personality. For example, Dunn once suggested that a dater delete a gym selfie from their profile and upload a picture of a marathon they ran instead.

Dunn suggested a simple thought exercise: Think about how your friends might describe you to a stranger, then pick photos that showcase the most important things a potential partner should know about you.

2. Weave an easy date idea into your profile

A common complaint from dating-app users is that conversations rarely translate into real-life meetups. This year, Hinge added a feature that blocks users from matching with new people if they have eight unanswered matches.

To encourage real-life plans, Dunn suggests planting an idea for a date somewhere in your profile, ideally related to food or drink you like.

Sometimes it's as easy as tweaking a statement you're already making. For example, Dunn would change a response to the prompt "The one thing you should know about me is…" from "I just moved to New York City" to "I'm looking for the best dollar slice in town."

"It sends the signal, 'We don't have to beat around the bush. We can just get to the date,'" Dunn said.

She added that another strategy is to name your favorite cocktail or café order and then ask where to find it in your profile.

3. Put one of your answers to a prompt in list form

Dunn said more is better when it comes to listing your interests on your dating-app profile.

You never know what word or phrase might pique the interest of a potential match, so put it all out there, she added.

Dunn recalled filling out Hinge's "I won't shut up about…" prompt when she was dating. She initially listed just her dog, Zoe, but then went back and added the Jonas Brothers and Sugarfish, a buzzy chain of sushi restaurants in New York and LA.

Her future husband ended up messaging her about the Jonas Brothers. The first dance at their wedding? "When You Look Me In The Eyes," by the Jonas Brothers.

"We've now been to 10 Jonas Brothers concerts together," Dunn said. "We may not have met if that wasn't on my profile."

• A recent documentary reveals what it's like to live in a home famous from a movie or TV show.
• Owners of the properties in "Home Alone" and "Halloween" have welcomed hordes of fans paying homage.
• Residents of the "Breaking Bad" house, meanwhile, put up iron fences and yelled at visitors.

Celebrity homes regularly make splashy headlines for their private beaches, basement bowling alleys, and dedicated trophy rooms.

But when the house itself is a celebrity, it can be a blessing or a curse.

In a new documentary, "The House From…", director Tommy Avallone takes viewers inside the iconic homes made famous from movies, including "Home Alone" and "American Pie," and television shows, including "Full House" and "Breaking Bad."

Some residents embrace the quirks of living in a fan-favorite home, where visitors might take photos outside, recite famous lines out loud, or even gather once in a while for a convention — like devotees of "Back to the Future" did in 2015 for the film's 30th anniversary. Other homeowners, however, take steps to keep die-hards at bay, from adding fences to charging for pictures.

Some movie-house owners embrace fans on 'pilgrimages'

In 2012, real-estate agent Marissa Hopkins listed the Winnetka, Illinois, home that Kevin McAllister bravely defended in the 1990 classic "Home Alone."

Hopkins said in the documentary that the spotlight can sometimes make famous homes even harder to sell.

"People want to come see the house when they're in town, or they actually make it a pilgrimage," she added.

John Abendshien, whose family owned the "Home Alone" house from 1988 to 2012, said that people started coming to gawk at the property within a year of the film's release in 1990 — but his family welcomed the looky-loos.

"It was a fun, positive experience," Abendshien said. "Why not share it with others?"

Fans of the 1978 classic horror film "Halloween" love to recreate an iconic image of Jamie Lee Curtis sitting on the front stoop of the film's main house with a giant pumpkin.

For years, Bianca Richards — the real-life owner of the South Pasadena, California, property — has not only welcomed fans, but made frequent trips to Michael's to make sure there are photogenic pumpkins on hand for their social-media shoots.

"I take my job very seriously," Richards said in the documentary.

Richards relishes the strangers who arrive at her front steps on any given day, accepting fan mail and action figures that people have sent over the years. She even keeps a scrapbook of thank-you notes "Halloween" buffs have sent her.

"I want people to have a good time," Richards said. "I just thought, 'I'm going to embrace this.'"

Other residents of main-character homes would rather fans stay far, far away

Some denizens of famous movie homes have gone to extremes to ward off fans.

The owners of the Oregon property used to film "The Goonies" have covered their home in a tarp to ward off photo-seekers.

It's a different story in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where the residents of Walter White's home in "Breaking Bad" have a fiery relationship with the TV show's devotees.

Comedian Luke Mones, who visited the home in 2018, described how his pilgrimage turned hostile in the documentary. The owner, who was sitting outside in a lawn chair, started yelling at him when he approached the home, Mones said.

"'The show ended eight years ago. Get a life!'" Mones recalled the owner yelling at him.

The current owner has added iron fences, yellow caution tape, and an army of "Keep Out" and "Private Property" signs to deter visitors.

"The owner is horrible. Screaming obscenities at my young kids," one person wrote in a May 2024 TripAdvisor review for the home. "Rude lady! Needs to sell if she doesn't like the publicity!" another visitor wrote in April 2024.

The apathy to visitors might be understandable: Some "Breaking Bad" fans, recreating a beloved scene from the series, have been known to lob pizzas at the front door.

• Realtor Patti DiMarco, 76, moved to Babcock Ranch after increasing concerns over hurricane damage.
• She purchased a $480,000 three-bedroom home and moved in two weeks after her first visit.
• DiMarco says she felt safe during the most recent hurricane season.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Patti DiMarco, a 76-year-old Realtor who splits her time between New Jersey and Florida. After increasing concerns over hurricane damage and rising insurance costs, DiMarco moved to the 'hurricane-resistant' community of Babcock Ranch.

Located 20 minutes north of Fort Myers, Babcock Ranch was built on land 30 feet above sea level. Developers took precautions for extreme weather events, like designing smart lakes to combat flooding and burying utilities underground. Babcock Ranch's field house, designed to withstand 150 mph wind gusts, also serves as an evacuation shelter for surrounding areas during a hurricane.

I used to live in a gated community in Naples, Florida, about three miles from the Gulf of Mexico. The homes were of various types, including condos with carports, condos with garages, and single-family homes. I lived in a two-bedroom, two-bathroom home that I purchased for $238,000.

My concerns started with the 2018 Surfside building collapse. After that tragedy, the Florida legislature required all condominium and homeowners associations to modify their accounting. They needed more cash for replacement costs, which would impact owners. I believed I would eventually get hit with a big assessment.

Then, there were the hurricanes. I was on the condominium association board, so I dealt with all the issues and the damage. I started to feel like it was becoming too much to manage. During Hurricane Irma in 2017, seven of our homes lost their roofs, and several people lost their cars. During Hurricane Ian in 2022, 18 garages were damaged.

I started to think, 'Where else do I want to live?' I wanted to stay in Florida but find a better situation. One of my grandchildren studied Babcock Ranch as part of a college course on sustainability. It inspired me to visit.

I visited Babcock Ranch for the first time in December 2023. I moved in two weeks later.

Last December, I visited Babcock Ranch, Florida. I toured it, returned the next day, bought the house, and moved in two weeks later.

I've been a Realtor for almost 50 years. When it's right, you just know.

Purchased for $480,000, it has three bedrooms, three bathrooms, a den, and a two-car garage. Although I'm in a golf course community and don't play golf, I like the open space.

Settling into Babcock was easy. I unpacked my stuff and went to the pool the next day. The facilities and each of the different neighborhoods are very welcoming, and the people in the neighborhoods are also nice.

There's so much attention to detail in the community. With the utilities being underground, the smart lakes absorbing water, and even the lakes' overflow designed to flow into the street instead of houses, I feel very safe in the event of a hurricane.

My flood insurance costs around $600 per year, and neighbors have told me that I may even be able to abandon it once the final elevation readings are completed.

For the past hurricane season, I didn't worry at all. I was still in New Jersey and hadn't come down yet. Still, there was a Ring camera on my doorbell, and during the storm all I saw in the video was a little palm tree blow. It was just very reassuring.

I was speaking with my neighbors here, and one of them, in particular, was very nervous. She had just moved and hadn't been through a hurricane season. I kept telling her, 'If they didn't think you were safe here, they would be telling you to leave,' but it's the reverse. They're bringing people to Babcock for shelter.

I miss some of the shopping in Naples, but I don't mind zipping around in my golf cart

The people here are a total variety. There are young families, retired folks, people working remotely, and people working in Cape Coral, about an hour away.

The geographic areas where people are coming from are also very diverse. I've met many people from the Midwest, but I've also met people from Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Massachusetts.

I don't miss being closer to the shoreline, but I miss some of the restaurants and shopping I had in Naples. New stores are coming here, though. We have a larger shopping district opening next year.

On the other hand, I drive my golf cart everywhere. I do my errands and then flip back to the pool and restaurants. It's like living in a little village from a Hallmark movie.

• US News & World Report created a list of the best places to live in the US in 2024.
• Factors such as housing affordability, job opportunities, and quality of life determined the list.
• Naples, Florida, tops 2024's list, followed by Boise, Idaho, and Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Deciding where to live isn't always easy.

Some people move multiple times in a decade, searching for new experiences or better opportunities. Others end up regretting relocating to their new homes.

While everyone's circumstances are unique, data can help narrow down the choices.

Every year, US News & World Report ranks 150 big cities based on factors including quality of life, schools, crime rates, employment opportunities, and housing affordability to find the best places to live in the United States.

For 2024's list, the South and the Midwest have the most cities ranked in the top 15.

Booming Boise, Idaho; outdoorsy Colorado Springs, Colorado; and the bustling banking hub of Charlotte, North Carolina, all consistently make the list of the best places to live. Newcomers include Austin, a growing tech hub, and two scenic South Carolina locales: Greenville and Charleston.

In addition to weighing job opportunities and housing costs, US News & World Report emphasizes each area's overall standard of living.

Here are the 15 best places to live in the US, according to US News & World Report. Residents find plenty to like about these cities, including relatively affordable homes, plenty of jobs, and lots of ways to spend their free time.

15. Lexington, Kentucky

Population of the metro area: 320,154

Median home price: $331,000

Median monthly rent: $1,600

Median household income: $66,392

Climate Vulnerability Index: 58th percentile (average vulnerability). This index shows areas of the US most likely to face challenges from climate change.

Known for: Home to over 450 horse farms, Lexington is known as the horse capital of the world. While it doesn't have the Kentucky Derby, Keeneland Race Track holds its own horse races twice a year.

14. Madison, Wisconsin

Population of the metro area: 280,305

Median home price: $415,000

Median monthly rent: $1,700

Median household income: $70,484

Climate Vulnerability Index: 6th percentile (lowest vulnerability)

Known for: Wisconsin's capital is also the state's second-largest city. Madison is a college town, offering plenty of chances to see concerts and sporting events.

13. Charleston, South Carolina

Population of the metro area: 155,369

Median home price: $617,500

Median monthly rent: $2,800

Median household income: $89,083

Climate Vulnerability Index: 55th percentile (average vulnerability)

Known for: With its cobblestone streets and 18th- and 19th-century buildings, Charleston is a dream for historic-architecture buffs. Plus, miles of beachy coastline are just a short trip from downtown.

12. Green Bay, Wisconsin

Population of the metro area: 105,744

Median home price: $318,000

Median monthly rent: $999

Median household income: $66,950

Climate Vulnerability Index: 15th percentile (lowest vulnerability)

Known for: Wisconsin's oldest city is home to the Green Bay Packers, a storied NFL team. Nature lovers can make the most of Green Bay's 25-mile Fox River State Trail, even in the winter.

11. Sarasota, Florida

Population of the metro area: 57,602

Median home price: $488,500

Median monthly rent: $2,800

Median household income: $68,870

Climate Vulnerability Index: 24th percentile (lower vulnerability)

Known for: Sarasota earned the nickname the Circus City because Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus moved its winter quarters to the beachy town in 1927. These days, the weather, leisurely pace of life, and lack of income tax all attract people to Florida. Sarasota, in particular, has become a magnet for workers, according to a January LinkedIn report.

10. Boulder, Colorado

Population of metro area: 105,898

Median home price: $945,000

Median monthly rent: $2,995

Median household income: $75,923

Climate Vulnerability Index: 12th percentile (lowest vulnerability)

Known for: Not far from the Rocky Mountains, Boulder is known for outdoorsy activities, including rock climbing, hiking, skiing, and cycling. The city's median age is 28.6, giving it a youthful, lively energy.

9. Austin

Population of metro area: 979,882

Median home price: $484,900

Median monthly rent: $2,000

Median household income: $91,501

Climate Vulnerability Index: 20th percentile (lower vulnerability)

Known for: An artsy, contemporary city, Austin is known for its vibrant nightlife, live music, eclectic cuisine, and college scene. It also has a long history of attracting tech giants, and even more companies have opened offices there since the pandemic. West Coasters in the industry have moved to the city, lured by the booming job market and comparatively low cost of living.

8. Virginia Beach, Virginia

Population of metro area: 453,649

Median home price: $384,500

Median monthly rent: $2,195

Median household income: $91,141

Climate Vulnerability Index: 18th percentile (lowest vulnerability)

Known for: Boasting a beloved boardwalk, Virginia Beach has miles of beaches, delectable seafood, and a mild climate. Murals, museums, and shops in the ViBe Creative District give the seaside destination some arty flair, too.

7. Huntsville, Alabama

Population of metro area: 225,564

Median home price: $315,000

Median monthly rent: $1,465

Median household income: $73,319

Climate Vulnerability Index: 54th percentile (average vulnerability)

Known for: Since the start of the US space program in the 1950s Huntsville has been a hub for the aerospace and defense industries. Today it's bursting with startups, alongside long-standing workplaces like NASA and Boeing. Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin also has a facility for building rocket engines in Huntsville.

6. Raleigh, North Carolina

Population of metro area: 482,295

Median home price: $450,000

Median monthly rent: $1,826

Median household income: $86,309

Climate Vulnerability Index: 13th percentile (lowest vulnerability)

Known for: This capital city has a busy downtown, free museums, and miles of hiking trails. Part of North Carolina's Research Triangle, Raleigh has a long history of fostering technology and science companies, creating a strong local economy.

5. Charlotte, North Carolina

Population of the metro area: 911,311

Median home price: $424,900

Median monthly rent: $1,950

Median household income: $80,581

Climate Vulnerability Index: 35th percentile (lower vulnerability)

Known for: Second only to New York, Charlotte is a bustling banking hub. Locals can root for the city's professional basketball, football, and soccer teams or soak up the art and food scenes.

4. Greenville, South Carolina

Population of the metro area: 72,824

Median home price: $366,500

Median monthly rent: $1,725

Median household income: $73,536

Climate Vulnerability Index: 55th percentile (average vulnerability)

Known for: In the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, Greenville attracts new residents with its moderate climate, burgeoning food reputation, and natural beauty. Greenville is also home to several major corporations, including Michelin, GE, and Lockheed Martin.

3. Colorado Springs, Colorado

Population of the metro area: 488,664

Median home price: $440,000

Median monthly rent: $1,873

Median household income: $83,215

Climate Vulnerability Index: 34th percentile (average vulnerability)

Known for: The US Olympic and Paralympic Training Center is located in Colorado Springs, making the city especially attractive to athletes. There are hundreds of miles of trails for hiking and mountain biking, and white water rafting is a popular summer activity. From the Garden of the Gods to the iconic Pikes Peak, gorgeous natural sights adorn the area.

2. Boise, Idaho

Population of the metro area: 235,421

Median home price: $472,500

Median monthly rent: $1,774

Median household income: $79,977

Climate Vulnerability Index: 9th percentile (lowest vulnerability)

Known for: Thousands of new residents flocked to Idaho's capital in the past decade, making it the US's fastest-growing city in 2018. Boise blends sought-after amenities such as microbreweries and cider houses with nearby scenic state parks full of rivers, canyons, and mountains.

1. Naples, Florida

Population of the metro area: 19,704

Median home price: $629,500

Median monthly rent: $6,100

Median household income: $135,657

Climate Vulnerability Index: 32nd percentile (lower vulnerability)

Known for: Located on Florida's Gulf Coast, Naples is like a postcard come to life, with white-sand beaches, luxurious residences, and over 1,350 holes of golf. The city has long attracted wealthy residents who can afford the high housing costs. Right now a $295 million compound is up for grabs, the most expensive home for sale in the US.

Sources: Population and income data are from the US Census, median home price from Realtor.com, median rent from Zillow, and climate information from the Climate Vulnerability Index.

This story was originally published on May 15, 2024, and most recently updated on December 4.

• 2025 should be a relatively calm year for Airbnb and Vrbo hosts, according to a new forecast.
• Occupancy rates are expected to remain the same or improve a bit, while supply won't increase much.
• Travelers are interested in houses with six or more bedrooms that cost relatively little per night.

Airbnb and Vrbo hosts can expect more consistency in 2025, according to a new report from industry analytics firm AirDNA.

"There's going to be a bit more stability," Bram Gallagher, director of economics and forecasting at AirDNA, told Business Insider. "The market is in a more mature phase compared to where it was five, even 10 years ago."

The short-term-rental market's roller coaster kicked off in 2020, when a surge in travel brought hosts record profits. An influx of new properties opened up, leading to a correction. Hosts have been adjusting their expectations ever since, sometimes lowering prices to remain competitive.

2024 has been an improvement for hosts in some ways. Demand for short-term rentals, as measured by the number of nights booked, grew 7% compared to 2023. Occupancy rates, the number of nights a month a rental is booked, declined from February 2022 to April 2024, but have been relatively constant since.

There are early signs that the more stable climate will translate to better returns for hosts in 2025. AirDNA measures a rental's expected revenue using a measure called RevPAR — or revenue per available rental, which combines a unit's average daily rate with its region's occupancy rate. For two years the average RevPAR declined, meaning hosts could expect to bring in less revenue than the year prior. RevPAR forecasts for 2025 have turned positive.

"We're going to be seeing some gradual improvement from here on out," Gallagher said.

Here are 3 predictions AirDNA has for hosts in the new year.

1. Occupancy levels will stay about the same

Occupancy rates went through a historic whiplash over the past four years. First, a lower number of overall listings following COVID-19 lockdowns met a nationwide surge in stir-crazy travelers looking for more space, which produced some of the highest occupancy rates in industry history — hitting a peak of 61.9% in February 2022.

Then, a flood of new properties spurred by an investor boom intensified the competition for bookings, pushing occupancy rates down to 54% in April 2024.

Rates settled around the mid-50s this year, and AirDNA expects occupancy rates to stay around that mark in 2025.

"It's such a slight increase, but we're going to be holding on to the gains that we've got this year," Gallagher told BI.

2. The number of new Airbnbs and Vrbos has slowed, so there's less competition

The post-pandemic explosion of new Airbnb and Vrbo listings is likely over.

"Supply is going to continue slowing, so you're going to have fewer new competitors next year to worry about," Gallagher told BI.

First, a tight housing market eroded investor appetite for new properties. Increasing regulations on Airbnbs and Vrbos in cities across the US and abroad over the past few years have also dampened new listings.

That's good news for hosts who already manage units.

"It's good for operators that are already in the market, because they've got barriers to entry that are already in place for anyone who wants to compete with them," Gallagher noted.

3. Large homes with relatively cheap nightly rates are likely to keep growing in popularity

One surprising trend from 2024 that Gallagher said is likely to continue into the new year is the exceptional performance of a certain segment of listings: multiple-bedroom homes that large groups can book cheaply.

AirDNA found that the largest growth in both demand and available listings in 2024 was for listings with six or more bedrooms in the "budget" category, or the cheapest 20% of listings ranked by price-per-night.

Gallagher explained that the uptick in interest might be a response to the comparisons some travelers make between hotels and short-term rentals.

"People are looking at the value proposition of renting six rooms at a budget hotel, compared to getting a six-bedroom short-term rental," Gallagher said. "It's been a change to the composition of short-term rental supply."

In recent years, some loyal Airbnb guests have claimed they are opting to stay in hotels more frequently due to issues like fees and chores.

Airbnb has intensified its competition with hotels in recent months, with one executive teasing that the company will soon start offering "hotel-like" amenities.

• Floridian homeowners face mounting uncertainties following hurricanes Helene and Milton.
• One resident is afraid of residents abandoning homes after storms if they can't pay to be fixed.
• An inland real-estate agent worries that some snowbirds won't return to buy new properties.

A destructive hurricane season has dealt a blow to Florida's housing market, which was already struggling with surging homeowners' association costs and a home insurance crisis.

In October, the five metropolitan areas nationwide with the biggest year-over-year drops in pending home sales were all located in the Sunshine State, according to a new report from real-estate site Redfin.

Over a four-week period ending November 10, pending home sales dropped 15.2% in Ft. Lauderdale, 14% in Miami, 13.8% in West Palm Beach, 9.5% in Jacksonville, and 7.2% in Tampa.

In Tampa, pending home sales actually fell as much as 32.2% during the month prior, when both Hurricanes Milton and Helene made landfall. The drop has leveled out at 7.2%, indicating the worst impacts may be over.

Pending home sales are deals where a contract is signed, but the sale has not closed. With a typical window of one to two months between the sales of homes and their closings, pending home sales can be an early indicator of market shifts.

Hurricanes Helene and Milton have exacerbated concerns about the future of property values and the cost of homeownership in Florida. After the storms, which made landfall in September and October, the state suffered an estimated $21 to $34 billion in damages, including uninsured properties.

At the same time, insurance experts have raised the alarm that an affordability crisis is likely to worsen. Some Florida cities, like Jacksonville and Cape Coral, saw average home insurance payments for mortgaged single-family residences jump at least 85% since 2019, according to financial services company Intercontinental Exchange.

"Florida represents an outsize amount of risk compared to other areas of the world," Kyle Ulrich, president and CEO of the Florida Association of Insurance Agents, told Business Insider in October.

For some residents, the mood on the ground is anxious.

Three Florida homeowners shared their concerns about the cost of rebuilding after hurricane damage, their home values, and the storms' impact on seasonal residents who are key drivers of the state economy.

Retirees couldn't afford to raise their home, then it was hit by a hurricane

In 2021, Jon and Lyn Drake purchased a home in Yankeetown, Florida, which is about two hours north of Tampa and less than 10 minutes from the shores of the Gulf of Mexico.

Their 800-square-foot house, located just feet away from a small riverbed, had belonged to a neighbor who died and cost them $190,000.

The dream home soon turned into a nightmare for the retired couple, aged 71 and 69. Last fall, Hurricane Idalia floodwaters reached within a foot of the house, the closest it had ever been, prompting Jon to look into services that could raise the home.

The Drakes said they were quoted prices to lift the house from around $130,000 to as high as $229,000, which they felt they couldn't afford.

"There's not a lot of companies that do it here, and it's just really price-gouging right now," Jon told BI.

Then Hurricane Helene barreled through Yankeetown. The couple lost their kitchen appliances, washer and dryer, and a new generator. The floors will have to be torn up.

For now, the couple is waiting to see how their insurance claims shake out to figure out their next steps. They want to rebuild, but are worried about how much of the cost they'll have to shoulder themselves.

"We're in a holding pattern right now," Jon said.

A coastal resident worries about his home value

John Adams, a retiree who lives near Yankeetown in Inglis, said his home was 15 inches away from taking on water during Hurricane Helene.

His home, raised 12 feet above ground, is the highest in his neighborhood, he said.

With the increasing power of storms coupled with skyrocketing insurance costs, Adams worries about homeowners in a pinch walking away from devastated homes. That could, in turn, lower the quality and value of the neighborhood. As Adam sees it, it's in his best interest to help pay for other peoples' homes to be raised.

"I'm in favor of paying for somebody else's fund to raise their homes. Because if we can solve that problem, it helps my values," he said.

Adams thinks either taxes could be raised or a new state agency could be created specifically to focus on raising low-lying homes that are most at risk. Currently, regional authorities like the Southwest Florida Water Management District are tasked with flood prevention and FEMA provides grants to some homeowners after a disaster.

"Nothing is ever going to fix or safeguard homes from flooding except 'elevate, elevate, elevate,'" he said "You can't outrun the water."

A real-estate agent thinks snowbirds could get scared away

In Ocala, located an hour from the Gulf of Mexico coastline, real-estate agent Emily White worries about how the severity of this year's storm will impact the snowbirds.

The annual migration of mostly elderly residents from cold-weather states who flock to the Florida sunshine to ride out the winter months plays a key role in the state's economy.

An estimated 1.5 million seasonal residents make up the snowbird flock, according to the Associated Press, representing a temporary 6.5% bump in the state's population.

"I'm praying the snowbirds come back this year. I need them to come back so I can get some of my listings sold, but we'll see how it's affected," White told Business Insider. "Will they come as hot and heavy as they did before these storms?"

White said a potential buyer from Arizona called her after seeing the devastation of Hurricane Milton, wondering if she might need to alter her plans to buy and how the storms would affect home-insurance costs.

Even if there's no immediate impact this winter, White expects the hurricane jitters to leave a lasting impact. Buyers who were looking at coastal properties might move more inland and some prospective buyers may choose to rent instead, she told BI.

"I think it'll deter people overall," White said.

• Older bathroom styles are back in vogue as homebuyers and renters gravitate toward nostalgia.
• Even younger people are opting for patterned tiles, matching sinks and toilets, and pastel colors.
• One 24-year-old Florida homeowner paid $900 for a baby blue toilet and vanity from the 1950s.

In August, Miami interior designer Dani Klaric shocked her boyfriend with the new centerpiece of her guest bathroom: a secondhand toilet.

The preowned throne, in a baby blue hue reminiscent of the 1950s, was part of Klaric's plan to "de-modernize" the three-bedroom Miami home she bought in May.

Klaric, a 24-year-old content creator with 2.1 million followers on TikTok as of November 27, fought hard for her used toilet. When she couldn't find the exact shade of blue she wanted in stores, she tracked down a seller on Facebook Marketplace who specialized in saving vintage bathroom fixtures from tear-down projects.

Klaric drove a rented U-Haul five hours across Florida to pick up both the toilet and a vanity for $900.

"It's way more warm and cozy and has so much more personality," Klaric told Business Insider.

Neutral bathrooms have dominated the pages of design and architecture magazines for years, but old-fashioned looks are coming back. A new Zillow report on home trends based on key terms and phrases that crop up more frequently in for-sale listings said, "2025 is set to go full granny." Mentions of "nostalgia" in listings were up 14% from 2023, while the word "vintage" showed up in 9% more listings.

Los Angeles-based interior designer Shannon Ggem told BI that "grandma bathrooms" typically feature pastel pinks and greens, elaborate tile designs, and frilly decorations. Once considered dated, they are driving trends in homebuying and interior design — even among millennials and Gen Zers.

"People are so bored of all white and gray houses," Ggem told BI. "They're so hungry for character."

Even manufacturers are observing the uptick in interest.

In 2023, kitchen and bath manufacturer Kohler reissued two "heritage" colors from its archive, a rose blush called peachblow and minty spring green. It released a limited-edition line of toilets, sinks, and tubs in the hues.

"People are gravitating toward things that pull at those nostalgic heartstrings," Alex Yacavone, head of Kohler's design studio, told BI.

Homeowners are paying to get the look

Interior designers told BI that younger homeowners are turning their bathrooms into time machines.

"I'm really seeing it grow with the younger audiences," said San Diego-based interior designer Rachel Moriarty. "They're taking that grandma aesthetic and running with it. They're making it cool again."

Moriarty recently said a San Diego client spent $5,000 restoring her bathroom's aquamarine tiles with black trim and 1930s Art Deco arches. Previous homeowners had ignored the tiles altogether or tried to paint over them. She and the client shopped for black glass knobs for the cabinets and vintage lights of the era to make the tiles stand out even more.

Ggem, an interior designer in Los Angeles, said a client is spending $85,000 on a total bathroom re-do to achieve a vintage look. The couple's home came with all-white, builder-grade fixtures they considered passé, so they're adding a floor with a tile pattern and a mosaic design on the walls, Ggem said.

"The basic finishes didn't feel like they met the luxury level of the community," Ggem said.

A landlord with 30 LA buildings preserves their vintage bathrooms

Forty years ago, real-estate developer Gene Bramson saw historic apartment buildings in Los Angeles being ripped up for the sleek, modern aesthetics of the 1980s. Bramson, who loved the intricate tile work and bold colors found in many of those properties, bought some with the intent of preservation.

"I wanted to take these places and elevate them, bring them back to their original glamour," Bramson told BI. "I just had a great feeling that these locations can't be replicated."

Today, Bramson's company, GLB Properties, manages 30 properties throughout Los Angeles, with rents ranging from $3,250 for a one-bedroom to $11,000 for a four-bedroom.

In 2020, Bramson's daughter Ivana, who also works for GLB, noticed Angelenos clamoring for colorful bathrooms. So she started posting photos of ones in the company's buildings on its Instagram account, which exploded from 6,000 to 40,000 followers between then and mid-2024. Potential tenants started reaching out through direct messages on Instagram, Bramson said.

Keeping up these vintage rooms isn't cheap. GLB spent $25,000 to preserve and upgrade a pink bathroom in a one-bedroom apartment in one of their properties, sourcing vintage tiles, installing a princess tub, and hanging salvaged mirrors. Bramson estimated a renovation with stick-on tiles from Home Depot would have cost about $9,000.

"The bathrooms are the crown jewels of the apartments. I think people can sense it's not a quick vinyl tile cover," Ivana told Insider.

Tenants seem to agree. In 2021, esthetician Biba de Sousa moved into a GLB apartment in LA's Miracle Mile neighborhood. She pays $4,000 monthly for a two-bedroom apartment with a bathroom covered in green tiles and decorative black accents.

"It's just cheerful," she told Business Insider. "It feels like my grandmother left me the apartment."

• 29 countries offer residence visas for remote workers, or "digital nomad visas."
• Spain and Italy have joined the growing list of countries offering digital nomad visa programs.
• Governments hope the visas will help develop more sustainable tourist economies.

In the lead-up to the election, Business Insider reported millions of Americans were considering leaving the country if former President Donald Trump won his 2024 campaign. After his victory was announced, searches for the phrase "moving to Canada" spiked — along with inquiries about international digital nomad visas.

The specialized visas allow remote workers to live and work in countries like Malta, Portugal, and Costa Rica — as long as their income comes from outside the country.

And as some American tourists consider moving abroad, dozens of countries have, in recent years, launched special visas designed specifically for remote workers to drive tourism in their countries.

In some countries, the visas have become so popular that they've had to start turning people away. As of October 2024, for example, Cyprus is no longer accepting digital nomads after it filled the 500 slots it had available for its visa program.

Nonetheless, there are still plenty of options elsewhere. Here are 29 countries that offer visas specifically for remote workers, the minimum income required to apply, and how much they cost.

Europe digital nomad visas

Malta

Malta, an island south of Italy, has a permit that allows nomads to keep their jobs elsewhere and legally stay in the country for one year with a chance of renewal.

To be eligible, you must be from a country outside the EU and EEA and have a minimum gross annual income of 42,000 euros. The Nomad Residence Permit requires applicants to have health insurance, hold a valid travel document, have a rental or purchase agreement, and pass a background check. There is no application deadline, but there is a 300-euro application fee.

Latvia

Latvia introduced its digital nomad visa in February 2022, allowing applicants to spend up to a year in the country with the opportunity to renew for another.

Digital nomads must either work for a company based in a member state of the OSCE (Organization for Security and Co-Operation in Europe) or a company registered in one of those countries for at least six months.

They must also have health insurance and make at least 2.5 times the country's average monthly salary of the previous year, which the government website reports is about $4,043 (€3,843). There's also a $63 (€60) state fee for the visa application.

Romania

To apply for Romania's digital nomad visa, digital nomads must show proof they can work remotely, either as freelancers, business owners, or employees of a company registered outside the country.

Applicants are also required to have a clean criminal record, medical insurance for the duration of the visa with a minimum liability of $31,580 (€30,000), make at least three times the average gross monthly salary in Romania, around $3,467 (€3,300), and pay an application fee of $126 (€120).

Hungary

Known as the White Card, the digital nomad visa in Hungary requires applicants to be employed by a company outside the country, have shares in a company outside the country, or work as a freelancer.

In addition to providing proof of health insurance and proof of accommodation, those keen on getting a White Card must earn at least $3,146 (€3,000) a month. Application fees can cost as much as $297 (€284).

Croatia

Croatia allows non-EU citizens to apply for its digital nomad visa program, which grants up to one year of residency for remote workers.

The program also allows residency for close family members of the visa applicant so long as the family meets the country's income requirements. To be eligible, applicants must make a minimum of 2,870 euros a month (or $3,035) or have a minimum of 34,440 euros (or $36,430) already available in their account.

Iceland

In Iceland, a long-term visa for remote work can grant you 90 to 180 days while working. The program requires that you are from a country outside the EU and EEA and also from a country that does not need a visa to travel to the Schengen area (US citizens can travel to Iceland without a visa).

Applicants must also have a monthly income of 1,000,000 Icelandic króna (or $7,156) or 1,300,000 Icelandic króna if they bring a spouse.

Greece

Greece started its Digital Nomad Visa in 2021 and is still operating today. The program lets non-EU digital nomads, with a 3,500-euro monthly income, stay for 12 months.

The application fee is refundable at 75 euros, and there's also an administration fee of about 150 euros.

Portugal

Portugal has been kind to digital nomads. With its "Temporary Residence Visa for the Exercise of Professional Activity Provided Remotely Outside the National Territory," or D8 visa, launched in 2022, non-EU nomads can still freely work there.

Applicants must be over 18 years old, prove income over 3,280 euros a month, and show proof of accommodation for at least 12 months. The application fee ranges from 75 to 90 euros.

Estonia

Estonia launched its Digital Nomad Visa (DNV) program in 2020, offering up to a year of residency for eligible workers looking to live in the Northern European country bordering the Baltic Sea and Gulf of Finland.

Eligible remote workers must prove they earn at least 3,504 euros a month (or $3,706) and apply in person at their nearest Estonian Embassy or Consulate. Application fees range between 80 and 100 euros ($84 and $105).

Spain

Spain's Digital Nomad Visa Program allows remote workers, their spouse or unmarried partner, and dependent children to reside in the country for one year.

Applicants must have an undergraduate or postgraduate degree from a "University, College, or Business School of prestige" or have at least 3 years of work experience in their current field, in addition to earning at least 200% of the monthly Spanish national minimum wage — currently set at 37.8 euros/day ($39) or 1,134 euros/month ($1,199).

Italy

Italy's Digital Nomad Visa is available to non-EU citizens who are highly specialized workers with careers that require post-secondary degrees or at least three years of professional training or experience.

The visa lasts up to one year for the applicant, their spouse, and dependent children. To be eligible, the applicant must prove that their salary is at least three times the annual minimum wage of 24,789 euros (or $26,221) and that they have at least 30,000 euros (or $50,000) worth of medical insurance coverage.

Asia and Africa digital nomad visas

Bali, Indonesia

In April, Bali introduced a Remote Worker Visa (E33G), which allows digital nomads to work from Bali for a year. Foreign workers in Bali must be employed by a company outside Indonesia and receive a yearly income of at least $60,000.

The application fee for a standard single-entry visa costs 12,900,000 Indonesian rupiah, or about $810.

Thailand

The Destination Thailand Visa allows digital nomads to stay in Thailand for up to 180 days per visit, on a multiple-entry basis, within five years. The visa fee costs 10,000 Thai baht, or $284.

Applicants must be at least 20 years old and have at least THB 500,000, or about $14,400 USD, in their bank. Employed workers are required to have a foreign employment contract, while freelancers need a professional portfolio.

Japan

Japan introduced a new digital nomad visa in April. This visa allows holders to work remotely in the country for up to six months. Visa holders must be nationals or citizens of selected regions, including the US and UK.

Applicants must have an annual income of at least 10,000,000 Japanese yen, or $65,000, and submit their applications in person or by mail to the nearest embassy or consulate general of Japan. A single-entry visa costs $22, while a multiple-entry visa costs $43, but some countries, including the US, are exempt from this fee.

United Arab Emirates

UAE's virtual work residence visa allows holders to live and work remotely in the UAE — including Dubai and Abu Dhabi — for up to a year. Applicants must make at least $3,500 a month and have sufficient health insurance coverage within the country.

The service fee to apply for the visa is 300 United Arab Emirates Dirhams, or about $80.

Cabo Verde

Cabo Verde's Remote Working Program allows remote workers to stay for up to 6 months, with the option of renewal after. Individual applicants must have an average bank balance of 1,500 euros, or $1,570, in the past 6 months.

The visa fee costs 20 euros, and applicants must submit an online form to indicate their interest.

South Africa

South Africa recently launched a remote work visa, which allows holders to stay for at least 3 months and up to 3 years. While details are still being finalized, the latest visa requirements state that applicants must have a salary of at least 650,796 South African Rand, or about $36,000, and a valid foreign-based employment contract.

Caribbean digital nomad visas

Grenada

To receive a digital nomad visa from Grenada, you need a valid passport, an annual income of at least EC$100,000 a year, or about $37,000, full COVID-19 vaccination, and valid health insurance.

There is no application deadline. The fee is $1,500 for individuals, $2,000 for a family of four, and $200 for each additional dependent.

St. Lucia

St. Lucia's Digital Nomad Visa program, "Don't Just Visit, Live It," has no income threshold. The one-year visa is available to remote workers, freelancers, and students.

The application fee costs $125 XCD (about $47) for a single-entry visa or $190 XCD (about $70) for a multiple-entry visa.

Curaçao

Curaçao's Digital Nomad Visa, the At Home in Curaçao program, has no salary requirements. Still, you must be employed, own a business, or have freelance clients outside the country.

Health insurance, a clean criminal record, and proof of accommodation or a lease on the island are also required. The visa application fee is about $294.

Dominica

To qualify for Dominica's Digital Nomad Visa, the Work in Nature (WIN) Program, you must be 18 years old and have a clean criminal record.

You will also need an income of at least $50,000 or have sufficient funds to support yourself and any family members accompanying you during a 12-month stay.

The application fee is $100. The individual visa costs $800, and the primary applicant can also apply for their spouse and dependents for a total fee of $1,200.

Anguilla

The digital nomad visa in Anguilla has no income requirements, but interested travelers must fill out an application at least 7 days before arrival.

Digital nomads also need proof of a negative COVID-19 test 3 to 5 days before they step foot on the island and proof of a health insurance policy covering COVID-19 complications.

Antigua and Barbuda

To nab Antigua and Barbuda's two-year visa through the Nomad Digital Residency Programme, applicants must be 18 or older, earn at least $50,000 a year, and have a clean criminal record.

Their employer must be outside Antigua and Barbuda as well. Application fees range from $1,500 for a single person to $3,000 for a family of three, plus another $650 for each additional dependent.

Barbados

Introduced in June 2020, the Barbados 12-Month Welcome Stamp offers a one-year visa for digital nomads interested in the island and the opportunity to renew.

Applicants must make at least $50,000. Fees are $2,000 for an individual and $3,000 for a family bundle and must be paid within 28 days of application approval.

North, Central, and South America digital nomad visas

Bermuda

The Work from Bermuda certificate was created for "remote workers, self-employed digital nomads and university students engaged in remote learning," according to the program's web page. It lasts for 12 months and is renewable on a case-by-case basis.

The application fee is $275, and interested applicants must be at least 18 years old, have a clean criminal record, and have valid health insurance.

There is no official salary requirement, but applicants must demonstrate that they "have substantial means" or a "continuous source of income," though no official range is provided.

Colombia

Colombia's "Visa V Digital Nomads" program allows expats from more than 100 countries to live and work remotely in the tropical country for up to two years. Applicants must make a minimum income of three times the current legal monthly minimum wage in Colombia, which currently equals about $885 a month.

The application costs $54, and if approved, the Visa itself costs another $177. People hoping to become digital nomads in Colombia must also provide a contract or employment letter detailing their employment agreement and compensation details. Entrepreneurs may alternatively submit a letter outlining their business project and financial resources.

Belize

Belize offers citizens of the European Union, the United Kindom, the United States, and Canada the chance to live and work in the country via its "Work Where You Vacation" program. Applicants can secure a six-month visa by proving they make a minimum annual income of $75,000 or $100,000 if applying with dependants. Kids under 18 are eligible to enroll in the country's school system.

Applicants must submit a notarized banking reference, a police record, and proof of travel insurance. The visa costs $500 per adult and $200 per child.

Costa Rica

Costa Rica's digital nomad program extends the country's 90-day tourist visa to a full year with the option to renew for an additional year. Applicants must be foreign nationals who earn a minimum of $3,000 a month or $4,000 a month if applying with dependants.

All application materials must be submitted in Spanish. The application costs $100, while the visa is an additional $90.

Brazil

Brazil's digital nomad visa (VITEM XIV) allows foreign nationals from more than 100 countries to work remotely in the South American country for one year and to renew for longer.

The visa is available to remote workers who can prove a monthly minimum income of $1,500 or an available bank balance of at least $18,000. Applicants must submit a background check, a copy of their birth certificate, proof of valid health insurance in Brazil, and documents proving digital nomad status.

The visa costs $290 for US applicants and between $100 and $215 for UK applicants. Expats from all other countries will pay $100 for the visa.

• Former Illinois residents Jason and Jennifer Remillard dreamed of living a simple, debt-free life.
• The couple purchased a $50,000, 58-acre property in Maine in 2019 near the Canadian border.
• They turned two $12,000 Amish sheds into their home, connecting them with a custom-built hallway.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Jason Remillard, 49, and his wife Jennifer Remillard, 55, who left the Chicago suburbs to retire on a Maine homestead.

They built their dream home out of two $12,000 Amish sheds, which are built one at a time using traditional techniques instead of mass-produced. The following conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

My wife Jen and I lived in a small town called Wauconda just outside of Chicago. Jen was a supervisor in the photo lab at Costco, and I was the director of quality and operations for a touchscreen manufacturer.

We were the typical American family. We'd sit down on the couch and we'd watch TV. Then we'd go to bed, and wake up. Rinse and repeat every day.

In about 2010, we decided that once all six kids were graduated and out of the house, we wanted to live an off-grid lifestyle and homestead. We spent 10 years preparing for the transition.

In January 2019, we found a piece of property in Maine on LandWatch.com. We flew up a week after we saw it, and hiked a mile and a half in knee-deep snow with our real-estate agent to look at it. We fell in love with it.

It's in the Houlton area of Maine, about three and half hours north of Portland. We're at the end of an unmaintained road on the Canadian border.

We paid $50,000 for 58 acres.

I loved the privacy of it. We only have a few neighbors within a mile of us.

We dreamed of a debt-free lifestyle off the grid

In June 2021, we sold our Wauconda home. We packed up our trailer and U-Haul, dropped our son off at the Marine Corps, and drove out here.

When we left Illinois, we wanted everything paid off. The property was $50,000, the vehicles were $40,000, the two Amish cabins were $24,000, and the solar panels were $12,000. Over four years, we put all that money aside so that when we stepped on the property in 2021 we didn't have to worry about anything.

It allows me to work two and half hours a day on the property and maintain this lifestyle without worrying about heavy debt. It's about being able to work on your home, work on improving your life, without spending two-thirds of your day at a job that you don't like.

It was really just a mad dash to figure out what the game plan was. We had no experience with this lifestyle. We made hundreds of to-do lists.

The first thing we had to do was mow the lawn. Then we worked on rebuilding the fence and had a gravel pad — a foundation for our homes — installed. We had to clean out the old shed that was on the property and fix up a temporary storage building.

It was just a lot of busy work. We installed solar panels so that we weren't running on a generator 24 hours a day. We had to cut enough firewood for the winter.

Being at the end of an unmaintained road, the Border Patrol informed us that our property was used as a "lovers lane," a place for young people to go and just mess around. So, we put up a fence along the road section of our property, just to let people know that we are actually living here now.

The Amish sheds give us flexibility for a permanent home

In 2020, when we had the property but were still living full-time in Illinois, we met one of our Maine neighbors on a trip. They were kind enough to invite us over and they showed us the Amish shed they had for their home. We weren't really sure what route we wanted for our forever home, but we saw theirs and just thought, "Hey, we could do this, too."

We reached out to Sturdi-Built Storage Buildings in Smyrna, Maine. We designed our own cabins, everything from where the windows are to where the doors are.

We're so glad we didn't go the log cabin route because these buildings are so incredibly versatile. Since we've had them, we've built a porch on one side. We're going to add a sun room to another side next year.

My first thought was to put them in an L shape. But then my concern was that the snow here in the winter. If I had my two cabins in an L shape, inside the L there would just be a massive pile of snow when it all slid off the roof.

If I were a professional carpenter, I could connect the two buildings at the roofline and make them look seamless like one building. But I'm not that guy. So, I built a small 5x5 hallway between the two buildings. It was the extent of my abilities, but it works fantastic.

When the cabins were delivered, they were just shells. The floor had insulation, but wasn't finished, and the walls were just 2x4s. There was no electrical, plumbing, or siding. We went through our first winter with no siding on our walls. We had to do everything. We spent around $10,000 making the two sheds into our home.

All of the hard work that Jen and I have done — I wouldn't trade that for anything.

If someone wants a big, elaborate place, the Amish shed probably isn't for you. This is for someone who wants a small footprint for their home. But they're adaptable to any environment, down south in Texas, out in Appalachia, up in Oregon, the Midwest, and, of course, here in Maine.

We've documented this journey on YouTube. It's to show people out there who aren't in their 20s that no matter how old you get, you can still follow your dreams.

• Some Florida real-estate developers are building what they call hurricane-resistant communities.
• Techniques used include tying homes down with steel straps and reducing flooding with "smart lakes."
• While no home can be hurricane-proof, these strategies can minimize potential damage, experts said.

Hurricane Milton was barreling toward William Fulford's front door. The mayor of nearby Tampa, Florida, was pleading on television for area residents to leave or die. Still, Fulford, a 76-year-old retired homebuilder, was staying put.

"A lot of people would say I'm crazy," Fulford told Business Insider by phone on October 8, as the storm gained strength in the Gulf of Mexico. "But my house is great."

In 2022, Fulford bought a $1.25 million home in Hunters Point, a community in Cortez, Florida, where properties are raised 16 feet above the ground and tied together with steel straps. Fulford, whose home suffered minimal damage from Hurricane Milton, told Business Insider he believes his home is "hurricane-proof."

More than a few developers are betting on Florida's future by building hurricane-resistant communities like Fulford's. Hurricane season officially ends on November 30, but the movement toward resilient homes has increased as the climate crisis drives fiercer storms.

The prospect appeals to Florida homeowners grappling with stress and uncertainty as home insurance premiums and homeowners' association, or HOA, fees rise and the risk of severe storm damage mounts. After Hurricanes Helene and Milton in September and October, respectively, the state suffered an estimated $21 to $34 billion in damages to commercial and residential properties, including uninsured properties, according to real-estate analytics site Corelogic.

About two hours southeast of Hunters Point is a development called Babcock Ranch, which bills itself as "The Hometown of Tomorrow." Its builders made efforts to protect its 4,000 homes on about 17,000 acres from storms, including moving utilities underground and avoiding paths of natural water runoff.

A rep said that in the days before Hurricane Milton, Babcock Ranch saw a 390% increase in daily visits to its website. Hunters Point's developer said that two new homes have sold since last month's storm.

Three building experts told Business Insider that no home can be hurricane-proof. However, Leslie Chapman-Henderson, the president and CEO of the Federal Alliance for Safe Homes, said that Hunters Point and Babcock Ranch are good examples of what hurricane resiliency can look like.

Building entire resilient communities — instead of one home with beefed-up protections on a block with regular homes — can protect neighborhoods and property values against Florida's unsettled future, she added.

"Our wish is to see all developers do this because they're on the leading edge," Chapman-Henderson said.

Hunters Point homes are high off the ground and air-tight

Hunters Point is in Florida's last working fishing village an hour south of Tampa.

The resiliency of its homes begins with their height. Located on a peninsula jutting out into Sarasota Bay, the development is just feet away from the coastline and vulnerable to storm surges like those seen during Hurricanes Helene and Milton, which reached almost seven feet.

To counteract that risk, Hunters Point homes — which were developed and tested in a warehouse for 18 months — are built so that the bottom floor is a garage and storage, the middle floor is the home's first floor, and another level above has bedrooms — all connected by an elevator.

"You don't step into the house until you're 16 feet above the flood zone," developer Marshall Gobuty told Business Insider.

Currently, 31 of the 86 planned units at Hunter's Point have been built, with homes ranging in price from $1.45 million for nearly 1,700 square feet to $1.69 million for over 3,400 square feet.

Another feature of the homes is an extra-fortified base, in which the slab and foundation are poured together as one piece. The homes' walls are built with 2x6 beams instead of 2x4 beams to increase resiliency and allow for more insulation. The sides of the walls, the ceilings, and the roof are then filled in with closed foam to make the home airtight.

Every level is reinforced with metal straps all the way down to the foundation to hold the home together.

These connections — roof to walls, walls to each other, and walls to foundation — are fundamental to building a house that can withstand hurricane-force winds.

Chapman-Henderson said the real innovations built into these homes are the fortifications against the wind: the walls bolted into the foundation and the sturdier wood in the frames.

Any vulnerability in those structural connections could doom the whole house. When that happens, "usually roofs blow off first because they're not connected well to the walls, and then the walls don't have any lateral support, and they go, and you've lost the whole building," Mike O'Reilly, a licensed engineer and construction instructor at Colorado State University, told BI.

In Hunters Point homes, though, "everything is connected. There are no seams," Gobuty told BI. "Every house is built like a Yeti cooler."

Babcock Ranch uses "smart ponds" to manage flooding

Babcock Ranch in Punta Gorda, Florida, is built on land 30 feet above sea level, far from the coast.

So far, 3,752 homes have been built out of a planned 19,500 units. The development functions like a city, with an elementary school, a middle school, a high school, a shopping district, a recreation lodge, and dozens of hiking trails. Homes on the market range from a two-bedroom condo for $255,000 to a four-bedroom single-family home with its own pool for $1.695 million.

When developer Syd Kitson purchased the land in 2006, his team spent hours poring over maps dating back to the 1940s to find the property's natural flowways, which are how excess water naturally runs out of the area during flooding.

The team intentionally sacrificed building thousands of units to leave that land untouched.

"That's part of working with Mother Nature, rather than working against Mother Nature," Kitson told BI.

Babcock Ranch also has "smart lakes," or man-made bodies of water throughout the development. These lakes have solar-powered pumps with predictive analytics that raise and lower the lake's height when a storm nears. If the area expects major flooding, the smart lakes will lower to prepare for the increased rainfall.

"Our philosophy is to do everything in our power to be as resilient as we possibly can," Kitson said.

Babcock Ranch welcomed its first residents in 2018. It faced its first major test in 2021 when the eye of Category 4 storm Hurricane Ian brought 150 mph wind gusts to the development. The property only sustained minimal damage, including fallen trees and a few broken solar panels, Kitson said.

Downed power lines and dayslong blackouts often affect large swaths of the state following major hurricanes. Babcock Ranch placed all utilities, including water, electricity, and wastewater, underground to prevent that.

"You won't see a single utility pole in Babcock Ranch," Kitson said.

The submerged power poles are built in concrete tubes designed to withstand 165 mph wind gusts.

Chapman-Henderson, of the nonprofit that advocates for safe homes, called the smart lakes and buried utilities "innovative" and added that recent storms have proven these strategies are effective.

Babcock Ranch is so well regarded for its safety during a storm that the elementary school's fieldhouse serves as a state- and county-designated evacuation center. Built to withstand 150 mph wind gusts, the fieldhouse provided shelter for 1,300 Floridians during Hurricane Milton.

"We're not a place where you evacuate. We're a place where people being ordered to evacuate come," Kitson said.

Hurricane resistance is the future of Florida homebuilding

Hunter's Point and Babcock Ranch are part of a growing movement for more resilient homes.

Chapman-Henderson warned, however, that residents shouldn't let their home's sturdiness make them complacent. They should still evacuate if authorities call for it.

"We can build to withstand these events, but we should never say it's absolute without fail," she said.

Calling a house 100% hurricane-proof is "like calling the Titanic unsinkable," O'Reilly said.

Though there isn't a single national standard for hurricane-resistant buildings, Fortified — a program run by the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety, an industry-backed research group — evaluates one of the most critical structures for a home's resiliency: its roof. Fortified grants certifications to homeowners who strengthen their roofs through different methods, such as using grooved, ring-shank nails instead of traditionally smooth ones.

More homeowners are requesting to have their roofs certified as stronger-than-average, Fred Malik, managing director of Fortified, told BI. Fortified certifications have risen from less than 1,000 in 2016 to nearly 12,000 last year, bringing the grand total to nearly 70,000 over the program's lifetime, Malik added. The program anticipates adding another 17,000 by the end of this year.

Though Hunters Point and Babcock Ranch have not yet participated in Fortified, Malik said the measures their builders are taking seem effective.

"I get really nervous when anybody refers to anything as something 'proof,'" Malik told BI. "But they are making some really good decisions."

• Would you trust your friends to curate your dating-app matches?
• Several new "matchmaking" dating apps have launched in the past year, addressing dating-app fatigue.
• Startups like Sitch and Cheers are using AI and social connections to match users.

Matching and matches are everyday phrases in the online dating app lexicon. But matchmaking? Less so.

That may be changing.

A slew of new startups have launched in the past few months centered around matchmaking in the age of swipe fatigue.

Sitch, an AI-powered matchmaking app launched in New York in November. Cheers, an app that lets friends play matchmaker in a social-media feed, launched in October. Facebook Dating even launched a matchmaking feature last month.

Matchmaking is by no means a new invention. People have relied on matchmakers for centuries, and have sometimes been willing to pay thousands of dollars to be paired by one.

Tinder's cofounder and former CEO, Sean Rad, told Harry Stebbings on a September episode of the 20VC podcast that he had always imagined the dating app moving beyond swiping and into matchmaking. Rad described an ideal version of Tinder where the app was trained well enough to suggest the right "person for you," he said on the podcast.

Big dating apps have previously dabbled in matchmaking. In 2017, Hinge (just before it was acquired by Match Group in 2018) launched a stand-alone app called Matchmaker that let friends swipe for each other. It appears to have since shut down. Tinder, also owned by Match Group, launched a similar feature in 2023.

The current trend of new matchmaking apps generally splits into two categories: Either the users themselves are doing the matchmaking, or the app (typically built with AI) is matching users directly.

Friends and family become matchmakers

Handing over the reins to your dating profile to friends and family may seem daunting, but several startups are betting on this form of matchmaking.

Loop, founded by siblings Lian and Adam Zucker, is a "matchmaking app where everyone can set up their single friends," Lian said. Only two-thirds of the user base are singles, though, Lian told BI, explaining that the rest are friends and family members — or even professional or hobbyist matchmakers. Loop launched in 2023 and is currently free for all users.

An app that's set to launch in December, called Arrange, is built around a similar premise. Developed by former Fizz staffers Ram Chirimunj and Zoe Mazakas, the app will let users link their profiles with a "scout," likely a trusted friend or family member, who can talk with potential matches ahead of time and vet for compatibility.

"I thought back on all my relationships and realized that they were all made by friend introductions," Chirimunj said. "I wanted to see how we could bring that authenticity from the real world onto a dating platform."

But some startups that offer matchmaking tools, like Cheers, recognize many people don't want to spend all their time matching on behalf of their friends — no matter how much they love them. Sahil Ahuja, an ex-Instagram engineer and founder of Cheers, is trying to bridge the gap between dating and social media with a friend-of-a-friend social graph. The app, which he describes as a crossover between Hinge and Instagram, is free and currently invite-only.

On Cheers, if a user spots someone they may want to go on a date with, they can send a request to their mutual friend on the app to make the introduction. Non-dating users can also send profiles or start group chats with mutual friends to kick off a connection.

"Because it's more social, it lends itself well to solving this more organically and feeling more like how you would date in real life through friends," Ahuja told BI.

Let AI do the matchmaking for you

Some newer dating apps (like Hawk Tuah Girl's app called Pookie or Rizz) are riding the tailwinds of the AI hype with chatbots that help people flirt, troubleshoot dating conundrums, and connect.

Sitch, for example, offers an AI chatbot experience where users can ask questions about dating. Users can also answer a series of intimate questions about their interests, values, and backgrounds that contribute to a profile within the app. The app then offers users potential "setups," where the AI will introduce two users.

"We've tried to replicate the exact human flow of matchmaking," Sitch cofounder Nandini Mullaji — who has experience in matchmaking friends of friends IRL — told BI.

Sitch launched in November exclusively in New York — but there's still a waitlist to get approved. Users can then pay for "setups," which cost $150 for three pairings.

Amori, a dating-advice app with characters users can chat with, is also experimenting with its own form of matchmaking using a personal assistant (though it isn't live within the app yet).

"We're trying to nail down the dating advice side of it with the coach," Amori's founder, Alex Weitzman, told BI. Down the line, Amori's AI dating coach will help users find potential matches through the app.

Will it really work?

Despite the string of new apps, New York City matchmaker Nick Rosen said he thinks it won't be easy for friends and family to find users a perfect match.

Rosen said he typically works with a roster of 20 to 30 people at a time and keeps a rolodex of 3,000 available singles in New York City for his clients to meet.

When he starts working with a client, he does an extensive intake of a person's romantic history, which he says is an advantage of a professional matchmaker. Friends and family know you well, but maybe they don't know the entirety of your dating history and scars.

"People open up to me like a therapist," Rosen said.

Though friends and family might be excited at first to play Cupid, the exhausting reality of helping someone find love can wear off, Rosen said.

Still, he thinks matchmakers need to change with the times.

"If we want to make matchmaking more approachable and cooler to people, we need to go and start having our own apps," he said.

• Arkansas resident GT Hill purchased a missile silo, decommissioned in the 1980s, for $90,000 in 2010.
• He spent $800,000 over 10 years converting the space but doesn't recommend others try it.
• Initially hoping to make it a primary residence, Hill has made it into an Airbnb, hosting authors, acrobats, and YouTubers.

This is an as-told-to essay based on a conversation with GT Hill, a 49-year-old former director of technical marketing who lives in Vilonia, Arkansas. He bought a $90,000 decommissioned missile silo and turned it into an Airbnb. The following conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

I grew up in eastern Oregon, in the middle of nowhere, so I did welding and many other mechanical things. I was a jet engine mechanic in the Air Force and spent my primary career in technology. I worked for a handful of Silicon Valley companies as a director of technical marketing.

One day, I was getting my haircut in Searcy, Arkansas. These old guys were talking about the missile silos that were around Arkansas. I had never heard about these places that housed nuclear missiles, so I started researching.

Probably 20% of my interest was in the doomsday prepper aspect or the idea of preparing to survive in the case of a catastrophe. I'm not a full doomsday prepper, but I like the idea of being prepared for the unknown, including having food storage and some survival skills.

If you talk to the hardcore preppers, which I'm not, missile silos are not that great, depending on what you think is the worst-case scenario. If it's a Walking-Dead-style apocalypse, you don't want to be in a missile silo because then you're trapped inside.

Another 30% of my interest was in the modern archaeology aspect of owning something like this. I really wanted to dig it up and see what was in there. Initially, I intended to make it a house for my family.

Lastly, I was interested in owning a missile silo because it's just kick ass. The place has 7,000-pound doors. Its three floors are made out of a steel structure nicknamed "the birdcage."

It's on eight springs and actually hangs from the ceiling. And the reason is if it gets hit by a bomb, it allows the structure to shake to try to preserve the equipment and the people inside.

Thanks to the rattle space or the gap between the floors and walls, I can put my back against the wall and push the structure to get it to move.

I bought the historic silo for $90,000. It was decommissioned in the 1980s as part of an international treaty.

I found my missile silo, called Titan II, online. I started talking to the previous owner in January of 2010, and by August, I owned it.

Titan II was denuclearized after the US and Russia signed a 1979 treaty to limit each country's nuclear weapons. The US disarmed Titan II as part of that negotiation, called the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks II or SALT II.

They had to destroy the silo in very specific ways. They actually had to blow up the top of the structure and fill it in. So it was an underground structure, but completely buried.

I bought the nine-acre site in Vilonia, Arkansas, for $90,000, which was about a $30,000 premium over the land's value alone.

There were three main components. There's the silo itself, a 57-foot diameter structure or basically a 15-story building, which sits underground at 150 feet deep. Then there's a long tunnel connecting the silo to the center area that's 35 feet underground. The last part of it is the launch control center, which goes as deep as 50 feet underground.

The whole process was risky and expensive. I don't recommend people try to copy me.

Some people look at an old house and think, "There's no way I want to rebuild that." I liked the challenge. I knew we could build a pretty cool place. It just took a whole lot more money and time than I anticipated.

I finally got money and time together in October 2010. I rented a large bulldozer and an excavator, and then we started digging.

The whole facility was full of water. We could see water pouring out on top of us, so we had to figure out how to open the front door of the control center without dying. When the door popped open, a huge wave came over us. It was scary.

There were other challenges. The place had asbestos and methane gas at the top of the control center, where the crew quarters were. I recorded videos of the whole process, and you can actually hear my voice change because of the methane in the air.

I had much more time than I did money. It's not that I didn't have the money to do it, but when you get the money, how do you prioritize using it? Do you throw it in a hole in the ground or spend it on a vacation for your family? Or upgrade the current home you live in? I had to make many of those decisions over the 10-year renovation period.

After spending $800,000, we're probably netting $80,000 a year in revenue from the place now that I rent it out on Airbnb.

People ask what the hardest part about doing this was, and it has nothing to do with the work. It's the mental side. You're spending money on a hole in the ground, and you have nothing to show for it. It ended well for me, but the average person shouldn't do it.

It's not a great way to spend time or money.

We've turned the missile into an Airbnb and have hosted YouTubers, acrobats, and a writer who lived cut off from the world for 10 days.

We still live on the property, but we never moved in full-time. We'd spend some nights as a family there, either for fun or as a shelter from big tornadoes.

There are no walls and doors, so there's no real primary bedroom. The top floor has a king bed, a large, open shower, and a free-standing bathtub. The middle floor has two queen beds that we can move to make more space. Then, the kitchen and the living room are on the bottom floor, which also doubles as a dance floor and can turn into a club.

We host anything on the property, including meetings. If it's semi-legal and people want to do it there and pay for it, we're fine with it.

The first booking we got was in November 2020. It was a couple coming for their honeymoon, but they got a little too intoxicated at their wedding to make the trip. They sent their best man instead.

Our initial rate was $275 per night with a $75 cleaning fee. Since then, we've raised prices a few times, so now we're in the $400-$700 range for a one-night stay, depending on whether it's a weekday or a weekend.

COVID was obviously still going on when we started to list it, and I marketed the silo as the ultimate social distancing. There was this YouTube couple, Kara and Nate, with like 3 million subscribers, who came to stay in 2021. They were travel influencers who started doing van life during the pandemic.

I would say 70% of our bookings for the next year came through the video they made about their stay. Today, I would've paid an influencer couple like that $5,000 to stay for that kind of exposure. With them, it was just a coincidence.

I once intentionally locked a woman in there for 10 days straight. In 2021, an author named Lynne Peeples called me and said, "I'm doing a book on circadian rhythm, and I need a place that has absolutely no indication of time whatsoever." She wanted to see what would happen to her sleep cycle. Before her arrival, I had to ensure everything that told the time was covered; even the Netflix account couldn't show the time.

We've had acrobats down there for a charity event. We've had bands perform. We've had birthday parties and even some swingers. I'm a pretty open guy. Just treat each other and the place well.

The only thing we haven't had yet is a wedding. And a lot of the reason for that is because of the stairs. It's five flights down, and typically, everybody's got at least one older relative in attendance.

It's been a pretty terrible investment, any way you look at it, but it's become more than that. It's now part of my identity.

• There's been a $30 million offer on Sean Combs' Los Angeles mansion.
• The home, listed for $61.5 million, was searched by the feds, who found "freak off" supplies there.
• The lowball offer comes from the same real estate investor who purchased Kanye West's Malibu house.

After more than two months on the market, Sean "Diddy" Combs' Los Angeles mansion has received an offer — and from someone who seems to have a penchant for buying up the homes of hip-hop moguls.

Bo Belmont, the founder of Belwood Investments, offered $30 million for the Holmby Hills mansion, according to a press release. That's less than half of its $61.5 million asking price. The firm has plans for "major renovations," it said in the release.

The real-estate agent representing Combs declined to comment about the offer to Business Insider.

Combs purchased the house in 2014 for $39 million. It is 17,000 square feet, sits on 1.3 acres, and features a wine cellar, gym, theater, basketball court, sauna, and swimming pool, according to the listing. The listing does not show any interior photographs of the home.

The home was searched in March by federal agents, who "seized various Freak Off supplies, including narcotics and more than 1,000 bottles of baby oil and lubricant" from his residences, including this one, the indictment against Combs says.

The mansion is in one of Los Angeles' richest neighborhoods, known for its proximity to Beverly Hills and large lots. The Spelling Estate, just down the road, is on the market for $137.5 million.

The home was put on the market just weeks before Combs' September arrest on federal charges of racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, and transportation to engage in prostitution. Combs has pleaded not guilty and repeatedly denied committing sexual assault.

"I want to remove the stigma and focus on the charming elegance of this remarkable property," Belmont said in the release.

Belmont's low-ball offer may not be entirely related to Diddy's legal woes. Luxury real estate in Los Angeles is currently experiencing a major slump, Beverly Hills agent Rochelle Atlas Maize told BI.

"Homes between $15 and $60 million are having a really difficult time," Maize said. "The list at $61.5 million is already kind of high."

Given Diddy's home's "dated" features, Maize estimates it is probably worth between $40 million and $50 million.

Still, the home is one of Combs' largest remaining liquid assets.

Since a series of civil lawsuits was filed against the musician last year, Diddy's business empire has taken hit after hit.

That makes his real estate assets increasingly important. In addition to his Los Angeles home, Combs owns a mansion on Miami's Star Island worth about $48 million, according to assessments submitted as part of a bail package. The home has been offered as collateral in Combs' requests to be released from jail.

Combs owns a private jet, too, which he is trying to offload.

Belwood made headlines earlier this year for purchasing Kanye West's gutted Malibu home, designed by starchitect Tadao Ando. The firm bought the house for $21 million, a significant discount on the asking price of $39 million.

The company allows individual investors to provide capital through an app to purchase properties. They become trustees on those properties until the homes are flipped and resold, at which point they get a piece of the profits. Through the app, individual investors can comment on the renovations.

Combs' home's reputation won't sink its value long-term, Maize said.

She pointed to another scandal-ridden Los Angeles home, the Menendez brothers' seven-bedroom Mediterranean-style villa in Beverly Flats, where the infamous 1989 murder of their parents took place.

The home languished for years on the market before finding a buyer in 1991. Maize, who was personally shopping for homes in Los Angeles at the time, said she wouldn't step foot near it.

"You couldn't give that house away, and now it's like the hottest ticket in town," Maize said, adding that crowds have formed outside the home following the release of Ryan Murphy's Netflix show "Monsters," which depicts the famous trial.

She predicts that the same turn-around will eventually happen for the Diddy mansion.

"It's all negative now, but the smart money knows it's always 'location, location, location,'" Maize said. "Somebody savvy will take the opportunity. It's not a bad play."