P.M. Edition for Mar. 20. As the costs of home ownership soar, Florida lawmakers are considering a far-reaching remedy: eliminating property taxes. WSJ economics reporter Arian Campo-Flores joins us to discuss why the state is unlikely to get rid of property taxes completely. Plus, President Trump signs an executive order seeking to abolish the Education Department. And a $6.1 billion-sale of the Boston Celtics basketball team is the biggest in the history of American sports. Alex Ossola hosts. Listen: Trump Wants to Abolish the Education Department. What Comes Next? Sign up for the WSJ's free What's News newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: Why are Florida lawmakers considering eliminating property tax?
President Trump signs an executive order seeking to abolish the education department. Plus, why Florida lawmakers are considering getting rid of property taxes.
Home values have gone up so significantly around the country that people are seeing their property tax bills go up alongside that. And so there's been a real movement to do something about that in a number of states.
Chapter 2: What is driving the rise in home sales despite stable mortgage rates?
And home sales were up last month. What's behind the rise? It's Thursday, March 20th. I'm Alex Osola for The Wall Street Journal. This is the PM edition of What's News, the top headlines and business stories that move the world today. New data out today from the National Association of Realtors shows that U.S. existing home sales rose 4.2 percent in February from the prior month.
That was far better than economists expected and was the first month-over-month increase in two months. Nicole Friedman, who covers the U.S. housing market for the journal, explains the rise, despite the fact that mortgage rates haven't changed much.
A few years ago, when rates shot up from 3% to higher than 6%, that really, really shocked the market. And buyers couldn't let go of what they could have afforded with 3% rates compared to what they could afford with rates at 6% or 7%. It was such a dramatic increase. that really spooked people. But now it's been a couple of years and rates have been hovering in this 6% to 7% range.
And so a lot more buyers have just realized this is the reality right now. And because they have their own life situations, their own needs to move, some people are just saying, well, that's where mortgage rates are and I have to bite the bullet and make a purchase anyway.
Well, yesterday's post-Fed rally in the markets seems to have sputtered, as U.S. indexes ended the day in the red. The Nasdaq fell about 0.3 percent, the S&P 500 dipped about 0.2 percent, and the Dow fell less than a tenth of a percent. With the markets wavering and the threat of a slowing economy, some investors are turning to a potentially safer option, dividend stocks.
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Chapter 3: Why are dividend stocks becoming more appealing to investors?
These are shares in companies that offer relatively hefty cash payouts. And so far this year, they're beating the broader market. Hannah Aaron Lang, who covers markets for The Journal, told our Your Money Briefing podcast why dividend stocks are so appealing right now.
Dividend-paying companies, they tend to be these... More mature, well-established companies who are perhaps not so concerned with growing at such a rapid pace because they're not plugging all the profits they earn right back into their growth efforts, for example. They've been around a while. Many of the largest dividend stocks, the allure is the stability of these firms.
So you think like your Coca-Cola, your Procter & Gamble. With a dividend, you're getting some form of return on investment in spite of stock price volatility. So I would say this is considered a safer, maybe more boring slice of the stock market. But this is a type of stock that looked increasingly alluring to investors, given what we've seen in 2025 so far.
Chapter 4: How are U.S. border agents changing their approach to visa holders?
To hear more from Hannah, listen to tomorrow's episode of Your Money Briefing. Coming up, why U.S. border agents are taking a more aggressive approach towards visa holders. That's after the break. Immigration officers are employing more aggressive tactics with immigrants and tourists trying to enter the United States.
For more on this approach and its impact, I'm joined by WSJ White House reporter Tarini Partee. Tarini, what's new about the way border agents are approaching travelers?
Border agents at airports and at land ports of entry are scrutinizing visas. They are frequently detaining tourists. They are being pretty aggressive in the way they question people who are coming through. This is something that we have not seen before is what we heard from lawyers and from former immigration officials in the past if there were questions about someone's visa or
They would be flagged, sent for more questioning, but usually they would be asked to come back with the proper paperwork or they would be held for a little while. But what we're seeing now is long-term detention.
I'm curious why this is happening now.
The Trump administration, when the president first came into office, signed an executive order that called for extreme vetting of people entering the United States. The president has said that this needs to be done for national security purposes. So what we're seeing is U.S. Customs and Border Patrol, that's the agency that deals with people who are entering the country,
Officers there are taking this very seriously and they're not really giving as much leeway as was considered the norm in the past.
Did you get any response from any of the other departments working on this?
We heard from the Department of Homeland Security, who said that the Trump administration is enforcing immigration laws, and they criticized previous administrations for not doing so. We've also heard from U.S. Customs and Border Patrol about the individual cases that we went through. And they've said that if statues or visa terms are violated, travelers may be subject to detention and removal.
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