Somehow, the most expensive house for sale is in Florida

Might as well throw your $295 million directly into the ocean. [Bloomberg]( This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a stunning indication of the crazy things that are already happening with Bloomberg Opinion’s opinions. [Sign up here](. Today’s Agenda - Florida [home insurance]( is hard to find. - Alabama [IVF services]( are maligned. - Ketamine-curious? Bear [this]( in mind. - [The Yale Model]( is in a bind. Florida McMansions Will Meet Their [Maker]( There’s perhaps no greater metaphor for the climate crisis than this [$295 million compound]( in Naples, Florida: Hedonism at its finest. Photo credit: Dawn McKenna Group The nine-acre property, Gordon Pointe, is the most expensive house for sale in the US right now. There are three McMansions clustered on the site — one primary home and two extensive guest houses — and a 231-foot basin for your yacht. The [listing]( says there are six bedrooms and (unbelievably) 22 baths. But for all the pretty powder rooms and pristine beaches, the listing fails to mention [the bevy of climate risks]( associated with beachfront property. Gordon Pointe is located in the Port Royal neighborhood, which, ironically, was [named after]( a famous [17th-century Jamaican city]( — a city that was literally swallowed into the sea minutes after an earthquake struck the town in 1692. The moniker could be prescient: properties in Port Royal have a roughly[ 26% chance]( of being severely affected by flooding over the next 30 years. And residents have already gotten a taste of what’s to come. In 2022, Hurricane Ian turned Naples [into a war zone](. Yet less than two years later, the real estate landscape in Southwest Florida is “[flourishing](.” “Florida’s business model, of course, is built on real estate,” Jonathan Levin [writes]( (free read). But its home insurance market is a complete mess. Private property insurance has grown scarcer and [more expensive](, and Republican lawmakers are starting to worry about the adverse effects climate change might have on the state. “If residents leave and newcomers are deterred because of the high cost of property insurance, then the entire economic and fiscal edifice will collapse,” Jonathan explains. Enter: Citizens Property Insurance, Florida’s relatively cheap government-baked insurance provider. The state senate recently [okayed a bill]( to expand the pool of homes that are eligible for the insurance, a move that will encourage ill-advised investments by homeowners. “As recently as 2022, there was strong support for shrinking Citizens,” John writes. The attempt by desperate lawmakers to expand Citizens’ footprint “will deepen the moral hazard problem, and the reluctance among private insurers to participate in the market.” Average residents in the Sunshine State pay $6,000 a year on home insurance, more than triple the national rate. But it’s [not just]( a Florida problem: “With wildfire smoke traveling hundreds of miles and [rain bombs]( dropping on supposed havens like Vermont, no housing market will ever be completely free of the effects of climate change,” Mark Gongloff [warns](. Even so, the most valuable “[dream homes](” in the US should be firmly on land, not [mere inches]( away from the ocean. Let’s hope the people touring the $295 million compound know that. Bonus Homebuyer Reading: When your [home appliance]( reaches the end of its life, replace it with the most energy efficient model you can afford. — Lara Williams A Petri Dish Could Put You in Prison Picture this: You’re a professional baker who is a bit of a klutz. Today, you’re making a red velvet wedding cake. The finished product is a showstopper that would earn you a [Hollywood Handshake]( on The Great British Bake Off. But when the bridal party arrives, the cake slips from your hands and careens to the floor. Your client is livid. But while you may have lost their business — and gotten a scathing TikTok review in the process — but you are confident your career will survive. That is, until a policeman arrives and charges you with murder. I’m kidding, I’m kidding. If we charged every clumsy person in the universe with manslaughter, we’d probably have more prison cells than apartments. Accidentally dropping a cake is not a crime! But what if you’re an embryologist who [mistakenly drops]( a dish of frozen embryos? According to Bible-thumper Alabama Chief Justice Tom Parker, you just murdered twelve children. Noah Feldman [says]( the Alabama Supreme Court ruling that fertilized eggs in a lab have personhood is “a stunning indication of the crazy things that are already happening in state courts since the US Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson decision, which reversed Roe v. Wade.” The dubious rationale behind Justice Parker’s concurring opinion begins with the fact that Alabama’s Constitution doesn’t really state what “sanctity of unborn life” means. So he wandered over to Merriam Webster and saw that “sanctity” was defined using terms like “holiness,” “godliness” and “inviolability.” Noah says those words — and the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision on [the praying football coach]( — were Parker’s golden ticket to declare that Alabama is a Christian state, more or less the way Iran is an Islamic Republic. The chief justice’s written explanation reads like a college paper about the codification of Christian doctrine. Not only did he quote his way through the Bible, he also referenced the 17th-century Dutch reformed theologian Petrus van Mastricht, name-dropped Thomas Aquinas (a 13th-century Italian friar who was afraid of [thunderstorms](), and called on French theologian John Calvin to explain the biblical prohibition of murder. “In my 30 years studying the constitutional relationship between church and state, I can’t recall any legal opinion that more expressly relies on Christian theology to interpret American law,” Noah writes. [Alabama’s IVF services]( are now as frozen as the embryos themselves. Read [the whole thing]( (for free). Telltale Charts The only things I knew about ketamine before reading this Lisa Jarvis [column]( was that it helps people with severe depression and that some individuals — ahem, Elon Musk — use it [recreationally](. But I didn’t know that it came in so many forms, many of them unproven. Some people pop lozenges of ketamine like they’re Luden’s! And others are getting ketamine microdoses delivered to their doorstep. [Law enforcement seizures]( of the drug more than tripled between 2017 and 2022, evidence that ketamine is ripe for abuse — a reality hammered home by [the death]( of beloved Friends star Matthew Perry. “Currently, the only version of ketamine [approved]( by the Food and Drug Administration to treat depression is Johnson & Johnson’s nasal spray Spravato, or esketamine,” Lisa writes. “But we don’t have much data on the effects of chronic use of the drug in many of the forms people are using.” The average Ivy League endowment fund gained only 2.1% in the 2023 fiscal year, compared to 11% in a global 70/30 benchmark. The terrible performance is “enough to raise questions about a strategy that has revolutionized investing — the Yale Model,” John Authers and Richard Abbey [write](. Is the Yale Model, which prioritizes long-term, real assets and minimizes exposure to equities, broken? Probably not. “Fiscal 2023, a year when investments in a few large stocks beat all comers, is probably an outlier,” they write. “A few more years like 2023 will be needed before key assumptions are shaken.” Further Reading Free read: Navalny gave his life to [Russia’s cause](. Listen to his message. — Bloomberg’s editorial board Surely Reddit has some advantages in [appealing]( to retail investors on Reddit. — Matt Levine Online betting is exploding in America — and it appears that [Apple wants in](. — Dave Lee Wrestling is cashing in on [the evolving tastes]( of younger generations. — Adam Minter Taiwan needs [a strategy]( for the possibility of another Trump administration. — Karishma Vaswani Bidenomics is actually [a pretty easy sell](, if you present it broadly enough. — Claudia Sahm Tucker Carlson is wrong about most things, but he raises [good questions]( about US cities. — Justin Fox The total “de-[Hamasification](” of Gaza will only lead to more chaos. — Bobby Ghosh ICYMI [Nvidia](, the “[most important stock](” on [Earth](, [stuns]( again. Former CNN anchor John Avlon [wants to unseat]( a Republican. The [Great ChatGPT Meltdown]( of 2024 is finally over. Kickers [PopCrave]( is the real world’s [Gossip Girl](. We should all have [major beef]( with beef. [WcDonald’s]( is such a clever [ad campaign](. [Swedish candy]( is suddenly inescapable. Help, my husband is [trashing my novel]( on Goodreads! Notes: Please send empty soy sauce bottles and feedback to Jessica Karl at jkarl9@bloomberg.net. [Sign up here]( and follow us on [Threads](, [TikTok](, [Twitter](, [Instagram]( and [Facebook](. Follow Us Like getting this newsletter? [Subscribe to Bloomberg.com]( for unlimited access to trusted, data-driven journalism and subscriber-only insights. Before it’s here, it’s on the Bloomberg Terminal. Find out more about how the Terminal delivers information and analysis that financial professionals can’t find anywhere else. [Learn more](. Want to sponsor this newsletter? [Get in touch here](. You received this message because you are subscribed to Bloomberg's Opinion Today newsletter. If a friend forwarded you this message, [sign up here]( to get it in your inbox. 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