The Tour Montparnasse in Paris recently turned 50. We spoke about that over here. But having visited the tower last week, including its top observation deck, I can now confidently say that I understand why many/most Parisians dislike it so much.

It is a complex that could be in any city in the world and it is clear that it has been seeing disinvestment for quite some time (presumably due to its upcoming renovation). 

However, a lot of the discussion seems to be focused on how its built form is a towering contrast to the rest of Paris. This is, of course, correct. But the same is true of the Eiffel Tower. One big and important difference is how these two towers meet the ground.

La Tour Eiffel sits in a beautiful landscaped park where people sit and hang out (photo by me):

Whereas the Tour Montparnasse is disconnected from its surrounding context. It feels like that train station on the wrong side of town (photos from Google Streetview):

So it's no wonder that its height gets picked on. What is implicit in this treatment of the ground plane is a belief that this tower is not worthy of celebrating. It does not deserve a beautiful park. And it does not deserve to be a ceremonial view terminus like every other icon in Paris.

Thankfully, the current design for its renovation appears to address this (rendering via Nouvelle AOM):

And this is arguably the most important design move. Ironically, what happens at the ground level could be what makes people finally appreciate what happens up top.

Zillow just announced that it has paused its (algorithmic) US homebuying business for the remainder of this year. The company acquired some 3,800 homes in Q2 of this year and, apparently, it now has a backlog of repairs and sales to work through. As a reminder, this business model, which is sometimes referred to as iBuying, is based on using algorithms to quickly value and buy homes (mostly online). The homes are then renovated and flipped for a profit. The problem, as most of you know, is that this pandemic has, among other things, disrupted construction supply chains and made it difficult to hire people. That has hurt the renovation component of this model.

Today's news was bad for Zillow's stock, but good for Opendoor's stock, which is their main competitor. Opendoor subsequently came out and announced that they remain open for business. (Disclosure: I am long $OPEN). But this announcement is perhaps a good reminder that buying and selling real estate remains a different animal than, say, buying and selling stocks. And so there are some perfectly understandable reasons for why real estate hasn't been disrupted by the internet in the same way that other industries have. Matt Levine does a great job explaining this in his recent column, "Sorry, Zillow's Computer Can't Buy Your House Right Now."

Here's an excerpt:

“I’ll pay you $350,000 for your house as long as a human can go out there, look around, and make sure that price isn’t wildly off” is an interesting model but it’s not quite the same as “push this button to sell your house for $350,000.” And “I’ll pay $350,000 for a house and then send out a crew to replace the carpets” is not quite the same as “I’ll pay $350,000 for a house and flip it 20 minutes later for $355,000, collecting a small spread for providing liquidity.” Computerization has come into the housing market, but it hasn’t taken it over yet.

One of the challenges is that the supply of homes is heterogeneous, even in a suburban community or in a multi-family building where you might have the same set of floor plans that repeat. Because maybe the home has been renovated and fit out entirely in gold. Or maybe it's the opposite and it has been poorly maintained. There are variables to contend with that have historically necessitated more rather than less human involvement. Homes are also something that don't trade all that frequently, which is less than optimal when it comes to online marketplaces.

But what if buying and selling a home was dramatically cheaper and easier to do? How often would people actually do it? Presumably more often. I agree with Matt that "computerization" hasn't taken over the real estate industry just yet. But algorithmic homebuying still appears to be one of the more promising approaches.

This is a really nice kitchen extension. In response to an "oppressively" low ceiling height, the architects -- DGN Studio -- lowered the existing ground floor by about 500mm. At the same time, they created a kind of "concrete tray" that fills the width of the Victorian home's property and extends outward to create a sunken patio space off said kitchen. From the outside, this drop makes the house feel as if it's sitting on a concrete plinth -- hence the name. (A good photo of this can be found here.) It's a simple move, but a good one. Sometimes you just have to play with the section. If you can't see the above video, click here.