Noah Berg

I split my childhood between Berlin and New York. In one city the rule was posted on the wall. In the other it sat in a code section nobody at the table had opened. I still start by opening it. A statute is the closest thing I have to a hobby. I am up early. A short run by the water, Berlin or the Hudson, depending on the month. Then the instrument, not a blog about the instrument.

I keep paper. I answer mail the day it arrives. I do not trust a summary that sounds like permission. People love a sentence that clears a country in six words. I write the date I read the text, and I put that date where you can see it.

The beat is access. Foreign, non-resident, citizen: countries split those words, then split them again by house, apartment, and sometimes district. Status. Property type. Tax. Letting. Financing. Each one is a column. You should leave with a table you can defend. Fewer rows. Dated rows. An empty column is a result. A filled column without a source and a date is not. No line that clears you without your own facts. When the official text stops, the page stops.