Tech Boom Hits San Francisco Rental Prices
online.wsj.com
Tech Boom Hits San Francisco Rental Prices
1–10 of 58 posts
Re: Tech Boom Hits San Francisco Rental Prices
#2Avalon at Mission Bay is a terrible place to live if you enjoy a good night's sleep.
Re: Tech Boom Hits San Francisco Rental Prices
#3I used to live in a building near a Google shuttle stop on the border of the TL. They wanted to raise my rent almost 20% y/y for a lease renewal, and the place was a trainwreck quality-wise (as was the neighborhood.)
When I went to move out, the leasing agent just shrugged and said "Some Googler will happily pay even more than that."
The real problem is SF prohibiting any dense housing from being built anywhere in the city and also the failure of running reliable/usable public transit to any region outside of the area bounded by BART and Market Street. Rent control certainly doesn't help (though I think there should absolutely be a rent stabilization law -- everywhere.)
Re: Tech Boom Hits San Francisco Rental Prices
#4What should someone do if they're moving to SF and want to live in SOMA or nearby neighborhoods? Does anyone have any recommendations? It seems like there aren't that many choices for buildings, and a lot of them aren't that new. All of the reviews I have read (for almost all of the buildings) sound mediocre or negative.
Re: Tech Boom Hits San Francisco Rental Prices
#5I used to live in a building near a Google shuttle stop on the border of the TL. They wanted to raise my rent almost 20% y/y for a lease renewal, and the place was a trainwreck quality-wise (as was the neighborhood.) When I went to move out, the leasing agent just shrugged and said "Some Googler will happily pay even more than that." The real problem is SF prohibiting any dense housing from being built anywhere in th…
I don't think they're prohibiting dense housing per se, just not approving/building enough of it. There have been several 50-story condos opened in the past few years, and several more currently under construction, but they're not enough to keep pace with growth in demand. It didn't help that there was a ~2-year lull in construction when a bunch of developers got into financial trouble during the financial crisis and had to put projects on hold. It's not as if SF isn't dense; it's the 2nd-densest city in the country, and way-way-way ahead of local peers San Diego and Los Angeles.
I agree on public transit, but it's not clear what to do about it. An east-west Geary subway line has been proposed since the 1930s, but it's really expensive to build in an earthquake zone, and the city / taxpayers just haven't been willing to pay what it'd cost. A cheaper alternative that leverages the already-built infrastructure might be to convince people to live in under-developed areas that do have good transit already, such as Oakland, which is actually closer to downtown SF by transit-minutes than much of SF proper is.
One thing that would help on the latter issue is if more of the suburban cities on transit lines also dropped their anti-development attitudes. For example, there is enough demand that there should be condos/apartments near the Palo Alto Caltrain station. But Palo Alto won't allow it, because they have some idea of an upper-class suburb full of single-family homes that they'd like to protect.
Re: Tech Boom Hits San Francisco Rental Prices
#6What should someone do if they're moving to SF and want to live in SOMA or nearby neighborhoods? Does anyone have any recommendations? It seems like there aren't that many choices for buildings, and a lot of them aren't that new. All of the reviews I have read (for almost all of the buildings) sound mediocre or negative.
Get roommates, get ready to pay, and don't expect much.
There are some great old houses in South of Market, but turnover is rare, and they're all expensive. There are some great/awful new live/work buildings there too, but most of them are condos and all of them are expensive.
Affordability comes in Outer Mission, Excelsior, Outer Richmond, Outer Sunset. Occasionally Potrero Hill toward Cesar Chavez. "Affordability" is relative of course, but if you're finding yourself priced out of the places that everyone talks about and look nice on the map, check prices in the places I listed.
Also, remember that East Bay near BART is closer to South of Market than most of San Francisco city is, time-wise.
Re: Tech Boom Hits San Francisco Rental Prices
#7I used to live in a building near a Google shuttle stop on the border of the TL. They wanted to raise my rent almost 20% y/y for a lease renewal, and the place was a trainwreck quality-wise (as was the neighborhood.) When I went to move out, the leasing agent just shrugged and said "Some Googler will happily pay even more than that." The real problem is SF prohibiting any dense housing from being built anywhere in th…
I think there should absolutely be a rent stabilization law -- everywhere
Do you think this on the grounds of economic theory? The empirical finding is that rent control laws limit the supply of rental housing unduly wherever they are enforced. What's a successful example of a place with a "rent stabilization law"?
http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/RentControl.html
http://econjwatch.org/articles/rent-control-do-economists-ag...
Re: Tech Boom Hits San Francisco Rental Prices
#8I used to live in a building near a Google shuttle stop on the border of the TL. They wanted to raise my rent almost 20% y/y for a lease renewal, and the place was a trainwreck quality-wise (as was the neighborhood.) When I went to move out, the leasing agent just shrugged and said "Some Googler will happily pay even more than that." The real problem is SF prohibiting any dense housing from being built anywhere in th…
I don't think they're prohibiting dense housing per se, just not approving/building enough of it. There have been several 50-story condos opened in the past few years, and several more currently under construction, but they're not enough to keep pace with growth in demand. It didn't help that there was a ~2-year lull in construction when a bunch of developers got into financial trouble during the financial crisis and…
Instead of a subway line, would it be possible to close off one of San Francisco's many east-west streets (Geary if you like, probably a couple north-south of there would be better) and run a light rail line (using Muni Metro or similar cars) on an east-west route?
You could adjust the timing of the traffic lights to ensure that the rail line always (or usually) has priority and cross the whole city in ten minutes.
Re: Tech Boom Hits San Francisco Rental Prices
#9What should someone do if they're moving to SF and want to live in SOMA or nearby neighborhoods? Does anyone have any recommendations? It seems like there aren't that many choices for buildings, and a lot of them aren't that new. All of the reviews I have read (for almost all of the buildings) sound mediocre or negative.
Realize you are going to get what you pay for if you want to live in SOMA. Realize that most buildings aren't new in SF in general, especially the more affordable ones. Then decide if you can't pay that much, whether or not you can stomach living in the tenderloin. Next up, you decide what other neighborhoods might be a good alternative, probably the Richmonds or the Sunsets, or maybe outer mission.
And unless you have 3+ months to look for a place every day, don't expect:
1. A bargain 2. That you will get picked for said bargain
Re: Tech Boom Hits San Francisco Rental Prices
#10Calculated Risk (http://www.calculatedriskblog.com) did a series on the upcoming SF rent/real estate bubble, as well as the return of housing back in early 2012. I highly recommend this awesome blog for my fellow HNers - it plays host to great discussions/links/facts on the economy, housing, finance and the global/domestic (US) recovery.
The direct links for those who want more detail:
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2012/04/san-francisco-rent...
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2012/04/bottom-for-house-p...
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2012/04/wsj-on-housing-bid...
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2012/04/private-money-comi...
And a summary about all of the above that I found on Quora can be found here (scroll to the bottom - ignore the editorializing): http://www.quora.com/the_edge/Intriguing-answer-on-Silicon-V...