VOL. 41 | NO. 50 | Friday, December 15, 2017
RICHARD COURTNEY: REALTY CHECK
The race to the top is going down to the wire. Back in 2006, the area set the record for the most residential properties sold in a calendar year with 40,056, Greater Nashville Realtors statistics show. November data reveal year-to-date sales have reached 37,236, some 2,820 off the record.
REAL ESTATE
Top residential real estate sales, November 2017, for Davidson, Williamson, Rutherford, Wilson and Sumner counties, as compiled by Chandler Reports.
November 2017 real estate trends for Davidson, Williamson and Rutherford counties, as compiled by Chandler Reports.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The rate on 30-year fixed-rate U.S. mortgages slipped to 3.93 percent this week.
TERRY McCORMICK: TENNESSEE TITANS
It had been festering for weeks, but the Tennessee Titans seemed to push the matter aside as they were squeezing out close wins against the NFL’s third-easiest schedule. “Winning ugly” is how it was seen through rose-colored glasses, with an 8-4 record as exhibit 1.
Jimmy Garoppolo vs. Dick LeBeau. The Titans defense has been playing very well of late, holding Arizona without a touchdown and shouldering a lot of the load while the offense has struggled. Garoppolo has injected a spark into a moribund 49ers offense, but LeBeau will surely have tricks up his sleeve for his defense to throw at the young quarterback.
VANDERBILT SPORTS
Only a couple months into his second season at Vanderbilt, men’s basketball coach Bryce Drew appears to be in the midst of transforming the program.
NEWSMAKERS
Erin Palmer Polly, a commercial litigation attorney at Butler Snow, LLP, will serve as the 2018 president of the Nashville Bar Association. In 2014, she was president of the NBA Young Lawyers Division, became a fellow of the Nashville Bar Foundation and received the Legal Aid Society Volunteer Lawyer’s Program Pro Bono Award.
BRIEFS
Lipman Group is partnering with The RE/MAX Collection Fine Homes & Luxury Properties, the luxury division of the RE/MAX pervasive brand. Effective immediately, Lipman Group will don the name RE/MAX Homes and Estates, Lipman Group.
BEHIND THE WHEEL
Most drivers in the snowbelt agree: Winter driving is a drag. Cold weather affects the way you interact with your car and the way your car interacts with the road. Freezing temperatures can make your vehicle’s cabin extremely uncomfortable, while snow and ice can seriously compromise your ability to maintain control of your vehicle.
BUSINESS BOOK REVIEW
It was quite the event. Your staff really outdid themselves, and you were proud of them.
GUERRILLA MARKETING
Good, old-fashioned sales calls are making a comeback, given how few salespeople are leveraging them anymore.
CAREER CORNER
For the 10th year, Glassdoor.com has released its Employees’ Choice Awards. For 2018, they’ve expanded the list of best companies from 50 to 100.
STATEWIDE
MEMPHIS (AP) — Crews removed two Confederate statues from Memphis parks after the city sold them to a private entity.
MEMPHIS (AP) — Items associated with Elvis Presley are on the auction block, including the rocker's rocking chair from the Jungle Room at Graceland.
REAL ESTATE
WASHINGTON (AP) — Long-term U.S. mortgage rates rose this week but remain lower than they were a year ago.
HEALTH CARE
WASHINGTON (AP) — As President Donald Trump completes his first year in office, Americans are increasingly concerned about health care, and their faith that government can fix it has fallen.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks are opening moderately higher on Wall Street Thursday, led by gains in banks and technology companies. Solid gains for Goldman Sachs and Chevron sent the Dow Jones industrial average higher in early trading. Wells Fargo was also up, and Finish Line jumped after reporting a narrower loss than investors were expecting. Utilities and industrial companies were lower.
ATLANTA (AP) — Home Depot is buying online retailer The Company Store, moving forward with aggressive plans to protect itself from competitors like Amazon.com.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. economy grew at a solid 3.2 percent annual rate from July through September, slightly slower than previously estimated but still enough to give the country the best back-to-back quarterly growth rates in three years.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of people seeking U.S. unemployment aid rose last week for the first time in five weeks, but remained at a low level that points to a healthy job market.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Don't feel bad if you don't understand how the new tax bill will affect you. Chances are, your accountant doesn't yet either.
GENEVA (AP) — Switzerland's financial markets regulator says the Swiss division of U.S. bank J.P. Morgan "seriously breached" anti-money laundering rules relating to Malaysian sovereign wealth fund 1MDB.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Republicans early Thursday unveiled a new, stripped-down spending bill to prevent a government shutdown this weekend and allow quarreling lawmakers to punt most of their unfinished business into the new year.
WASHINGTON (AP) — You wouldn't know it from President Donald Trump's rhetoric, but the tax overhaul coming into effect is heavily tilted to the rich. It also leaves "Obamacare" in place, despite his assertion that the tax plan repeals the health care law. Nothing about the plan provides the fuel to achieve economic growth at the levels he's predicted.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A triumphant President Donald Trump and jubilant fellow Republicans celebrated the passage of their $1.5 trillion tax overhaul Wednesday as a "historic victory for the American people." The American people, however, will need some convincing.
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 20
NASHVILLE AREA
NASHVILLE (AP) — Major League Soccer is continuing its expansion into the southeast, awarding Nashville the first of its newest expansion franchises as MLS' 24th team .
MIDSTATE
NASHVILLE (AP) — A top Republican strategist says a 308-vote special election victory in a heavily GOP state Senate district should serve as a wakeup call for the state party in Tennessee.
NASHVILLE (AP) — State officials say an engineering and manufacturing company will invest $6 million and hire about 240 people for a new facility in Tennessee.
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) — Insufficient warning by Great Smoky Mountains National Park officials contributed to dramatically less time to evacuate people during a Tennessee wildfire that killed 14 people in November 2016, according to a report released this week.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Florida Gov. Rick Scott is headlining a fundraiser for Republican Diane Black's gubernatorial campaign in Tennessee.
SPORTS
NASHVILLE (AP) — Brandon Tanev's first goal in almost two months came at a perfect time for the Jets.
HEALTH CARE
WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress dealt a pair of blows to the Obama health care law Wednesday, including a retreat by two senators who were fighting for a provision this year that would help contain premium costs.
PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Republican Sen. Susan Collins is letting the GOP's Senate leadership off the hook on her promise to shore up health care premiums by year's end in return for supporting the tax overhaul. But she said she will resume the push in the new year.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has prematurely declared "Obamacare" dead and displayed a misunderstanding of where the money comes from to make the health law work.
REAL ESTATE
WASHINGTON (AP) — Americans purchased homes at the fastest pace in nearly 11 years, as sales climbed 5.6 percent in November.
AUTO INDUSTRY
TOKYO (AP) — Toyota Motor Corp. says it sold 10.35 million vehicles around the world this year, up 2 percent from the previous year, and predicts higher sales next year.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks bounced around Wednesday and finished little changed after Congress passed the Republican-sponsored tax bill. Smaller companies fared the best.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Students who were defrauded by the for-profit Corinthian Colleges may not get their loans forgiven entirely, the Education Department announced Wednesday, in a reversal of the Obama administration policy of wiping out the debt.
ATLANTA (AP) — The CEO of Delta Air Lines says the company will seek compensation for its losses after a power outage knocked out the Atlanta airport's power supply and also its backup electricity for about 11 hours Sunday.
BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Ride-hailing service Uber suffered a new blow Wednesday as the European Union's top court ruled that it should be regulated like a taxi company and not a technology service, a decision that crimps its activities around Europe and could weigh on other app-based companies too.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump might wait until next year to sign the tax bill into law, delaying $120 billion in automatic cuts to popular programs such as Medicare and sparing Republicans from having to explain them in an election year.
WASHINGTON (AP) — It's a once-in-a-generation opportunity to fix a tax code that stifles business investment, keeps trillions in corporate profits languishing overseas and slows the American economy.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican Sen. Jeff Flake said Wednesday that party leaders have assured him the Senate will vote in January on bipartisan legislation to protect certain young immigrants from deportation.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Jubilant Republicans pushed on early Wednesday to the verge of the most sweeping rewrite of the nation's tax laws in more than three decades, a deeply unpopular bill they insist Americans will learn to love when they see their paychecks in the new year. President Donald Trump cheered the lawmakers on, eager to claim his first major legislative victory.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Count President Donald Trump among the personal winners in the $1.5 trillion tax package that Republicans in the House and Senate passed Wednesday. It's not only a political score for Trump but likely a windfall for his real estate empire, too.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republicans in Congress are pressing the legislative finish line on their sweeping revamp of the nation's tax code, with a final vote in the House set for Wednesday. President Donald Trump is aching to sign it before Christmas.
WASHINGTON (AP) — So what's in the massive $1.5 trillion Republican tax package, what's not and what does it mean for most Americans?
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 19
COURTS
NASHVILLE (AP) — A judge has thrown out a lawsuit seeking to block plans for a new Major League Soccer stadium in Nashville.
NASHVILLE AREA
NEW YORK (AP) — Major League Soccer plans to announce Wednesday that Nashville will be awarded an expansion team, a person with direct knowledge told The Associated Press.
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) — State lawmakers, not Tennessee's public colleges and universities, must decide whether to offer in-state tuition breaks for students whose parents brought or kept them in the country illegally, according to an opinion by the state attorney general.
MIDSTATE
MURFREESBORO (AP) — Middle Tennessee State University has landed a $148,000 federal grant for a ginseng experiment.
REAL ESTATE
WASHINGTON (AP) — Construction of new homes increased 3.3 percent in November — with the gain largely coming from single-family houses being built at the strongest pace in more than a decade.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — After big gains over the last two days, U.S. stocks declined Tuesday after the House of Representative approved the Republican-backed tax bill, which would lower corporate tax rates.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A GOP-controlled Senate panel rebuffed President Donald Trump on Tuesday, killing the nomination of his controversial pick to run the Export-Import Bank.
NEW YORK (AP) — Jack in the Box is selling the Qdoba restaurant chain to private-equity firm Apollo Global Management for $350 million in cash.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Gleeful Republicans on Tuesday muscled the most sweeping rewrite of the nation's tax laws in more than three decades through the House. House Speaker Paul Ryan dismissed criticism of the widely unpopular package and insisted "results are what's going to make this popular."
WASHINGTON (AP) — The tea party class of 2010 vowed to usher in a new era for the Republican Party, one where conservatives clamoring for fiscal discipline would roll back government spending to rein in trillion-plus budget deficits.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republicans in Congress are barreling ahead on their sweeping revamp of the nation's tax code, with final votes in the House and Senate on Tuesday. President Donald Trump is aching to sign it before Christmas.
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Speaker Paul Ryan told reporters Tuesday that he's not leaving his job "anytime soon," minutes after getting a standing ovation from colleagues when he told them the same thing.
WASHINGTON (AP) — In laying out his national security strategy, President Donald Trump sold short the records of his predecessors, speaking as if the energy boom started with him and the gates of America were wide open before he came along.
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Republicans on Monday unveiled an $81 billion disaster aid package to help hurricane-ravaged communities and states hit by wildfires, almost double the amount requested by President Donald Trump.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump's administration is publicly blaming North Korea for a ransomware attack that infected hundreds of thousands of computers worldwide in May and crippled parts of Britain's National Health Service.
MONDAY, DECEMBER 18
NASHVILLE AREA
NASHVILLE (AP) — The mayor of Nashville has proposed about $2.9 million in economic incentives for a health technology company's planned expansion.
MIDSTATE
BRENTWOOD (AP) — Tennessee songwriter Lee Thomas Miller is dropping out of the race for the Republican nomination to succeed Rep. Marsha Blackburn in Congress.
SPORTS
SANTA CLARA, Calif. (AP) — Off the field, out of that No. 10 uniform that is becoming all the rage around here, Jimmy Garoppolo hardly stands out as the star of the San Francisco 49ers.
REAL ESTATE
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. homebuilders are feeling more optimistic than they have in nearly two decades.
AUTO INDUSTRY
TOKYO (AP) — Toyota plans to offer more than 10 purely electric vehicle models in its lineup by the early 2020s, marking the Japanese automaker's commitment to that growing technology sector.
COURTS
WASHINGTON (AP) — A White House official says the Trump judicial nominee whose qualifications were questioned by Republican senator has withdrawn his nomination.
TECHNOLOGY
NEW YORK (AP) — Twitter has begun enforcing stricter policies on violent and abusive content like hateful images or symbols, including those attached to user profiles.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks climbed again Monday and set more records as investors grew more certain Republicans will pass their tax plan this week. Technology companies climbed, as did banks and retailers, which are likely to see lower taxes.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Shoppers braving the mall this holiday season may notice more that's new than the day's discounts.
NEW YORK (AP) — ESPN President John Skipper says he is resigning to take care of a substance abuse problem.
NEW YORK (AP) — Campbell Soup will spend $4.87 billion in cash for Snyder's-Lance, gorging on a snack market that has grown increasingly competitive.
NEW YORK (AP) — "Star Wars: The Last Jedi" will happily settle for second.
PARIS (AP) — French economy minister Bruno Le Maire has launched a lawsuit against American e-commerce giant Amazon for imposing unfair commercial relationships to suppliers in the country.
ATLANTA (AP) — Airport operations were resuming Monday morning in Atlanta, a day after a crippling power outage left thousands stranded.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Republican tax bill would cut 2018 taxes on average across all income groups, with the biggest reductions by far going to upper-income people, a group of nonpartisan tax analysts said Monday.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republicans rallied to GOP Sen. Bob Corker's defense Monday, rejecting a report that the Tennessee lawmaker stealthily tucked a provision into the massive tax package to benefit himself financially and then reversed course to back the bill.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is outlining a new national security strategy that refocuses the United States' relationship with the rest of the world, essentially implementing President Donald Trump's "America First" mantra on a global scale.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump often talks about a pile of money sitting overseas that will come flooding back into the U.S. once his tax plan is in place. That's something of a mirage.
FRIDAY, DECEMBER 15
NASHVILLE AREA
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (AP) — Shares of CSX slid Friday after the railroad said CEO Hunter Harrison will take a medical leave "due to unexpected complications from a recent illness."
MIDSTATE
MOUNT PLEASANT (AP) — A Tennessee county Democratic Party chairman has resigned after facing a domestic assault charge that was dropped.
STATEWIDE
MEMPHIS (AP) — A former deputy commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Commerce and Insurance has died in a car crash.
NASHVILLE (AP) — The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation says firearm-related criminal offenses have increased by almost 25 percent over a four-year period.
NASHVILLE (AP) — A report by an education advocacy group has found that enrollment and retention have increased at Tennessee community colleges, but dropout rates remain alarmingly high, especially among poor and minority students.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Democrat James Mackler says he's dropping out of the U.S. Senate race in Tennessee to replace Sen. Bob Corker, a move that appears to clear the path to the Democratic nomination for former Gov. Phil Bredesen.
NASHVILLE (AP) — A new poll says Tennesseans are more moderate than their neighbors think they are.
SPORTS
KNOXVILLE (AP) — Former Tennessee director of football operations Chris Spognardi has pleaded guilty to a charge of official misconduct related to the handling of team travel expenses.
EDMONTON, Alberta (AP) — Juuse Saros definitely made the most of a rare start in net for Nashville.
TECHNOLOGY
Now that the federal government has rolled back the internet protections it put in place two years ago, the big question is: What does the repeal of "net neutrality' rules mean to you?
NEW YORK (AP) — The Federal Communications Commission repealed the Obama-era "net neutrality" rules Thursday, giving internet service providers like Verizon, Comcast and AT&T a free hand to slow or block websites and apps as they see fit or charge more for faster speeds.
NEW YORK (AP) — As the federal government prepares to unravel sweeping net-neutrality rules that guaranteed equal access to the internet, advocates of the regulations are bracing for a long fight.
NEW YORK (AP) — "Net neutrality" regulations, designed to prevent internet service providers like Verizon, AT&T, Comcast and Charter from favoring some sites and apps over others, are on the chopping block. On Thursday, the Federal Communications Commission plans to vote on a proposal that would not only undo the Obama-era rules that have been in place since 2015, but will forbid states to put anything similar in place.
SPORTS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Leaders from the NFL, NBA, NHL and Major League Baseball players associations have helped unveil a universal declaration of player rights that is designed to establish a new approach to governing sports and protecting athletes.
HEALTH CARE
WASHINGTON (AP) — A deadline burst of sign-ups is punctuating a tumultuous year for former President Barack Obama's health care law.
NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
Wall Street capped the week with broad gains, propelling the major stock indexes to a new set of milestones Friday.
TOKYO (AP) — Global income inequality has worsened over the past four decades, a report finds, with the wealthiest 1 percent of the world's population capturing twice as much income growth as the bottom half.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. industrial production rose 0.2 percent in November due to a rebound in extracting oil and natural gas after a stoppage due to Hurricane Nate.
NEW YORK (AP) — After years of tremors, the earthquake that had long been predicted finally shook Hollywood.
BRUSSELS (AP) — Leaders of 27 European Union nations gave British Prime Minister Theresa May an early Christmas present on Friday, declaring that Brexit talks can move on to their next phase: transition and future relations. But there is hard work and uncertainty ahead when negotiations resume in the new year.
NEW YORK (AP) — A payment technology company says shoppers spent strongly to start the holiday season and then cooled off, but the overall pace is still stronger than a year ago.
NEW YORK (AP) — Disney is buying the Murdoch family's Fox movie and television studios and some cable and international TV businesses for about $52.4 billion, as the home of Mickey Mouse tries to meet competition from technology companies in the entertainment business.
NEW YORK (AP) — Disney is buying a large part of Fox , but Fox News Channel and other U.S. television businesses are staying with the Murdoch family.
Comforted by a strong economy, more Americans than ever are expected to travel over the Christmas and New Year's holidays.
NEW YORK (AP) — Ailing Sears Holdings Corp. has started to sell DieHard-branded battery-related accessories like jump starters and battery chargers on Amazon.com.
Delta Air Lines has picked Europe's Airbus over Boeing for a huge order of new jets. Delta said Thursday that it will order 100 Airbus A321neo jets with a sticker price of $12.7 billion and take an option to buy another 100 jets, a deal that Chicago-based Boeing had hoped to land.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. consumers went on a shopping binge last month as the holiday season began, leading to big gains among online retailers, electronics stores and furniture stores.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republicans solidified support for their major overhaul of the nation's tax laws Friday, securing endorsements from wavering senators as they pushed to muscle their bill through Congress next week and give President Donald Trump his first major legislative victory.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump frequently casts his first year in office as a string of successes and campaign promises fulfilled. But less than a quarter of Americans think Trump has made good on the pledges he made to voters while running for president, according to a new poll by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump and his administration are ignoring one side of the ledger when they claim big savings from the federal regulations they've been able to roll back over most of this year.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Most Americans think Donald Trump did something illegal or at least unethical regarding ties between his presidential campaign and Russia — and they think he's trying to obstruct the investigation looking into those possible connections.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is relishing the rolling back of federal rules in his administration's first year even as critics say he has tried to dismantle important protections for the environment, consumers and others.
NEW YORK (AP) — As a Republican-backed tax cut bill makes its way through Congress, some investors are scouring the market for potential winners and losers: companies they think will benefit the most, and those who'll be left out. But it might not be that simple.
HAMPTON, N.H. (AP) — Since President Donald Trump vowed this summer to pull the United States out of an international climate accord, states looking to tackle carbon pollution have been forced to go it alone.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican lawmakers have dropped from the tax bill provisions that were criticized by students and educators as making college less affordable.