161–170 of 542 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Gentrification makes housing more expensive in the short term. First order, that's good for landlords and bad for renters. Mixed for owner-occupiers - they have more wealth, but higher property taxes.
Not in California it isn't. Prop 13 limits property tax rates for owners.
So are there any tech hubs right now that aren't dealing with issues of rent increases, gentrifications, and growing pains?
Once the startups make it, rather than develop large campuses in the bay area they can expand elsewhere and take advantage of those workforces.
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Boulder as well. A buddy of mine had a hell of a time getting a condo with a mortgage. They were all bought up in cash within a day or 2.
Who are these people and where are they getting that kind of cash?
It's a combination of
1.) Wealthy Asian businesspeople who are looking for a place to park some of the foreign reserves they own overseas.
2.) Hedge funds, investing institutional capital in relatively "safe" investments with guaranteed revenue streams.
3.) Corporate prop-trading desks, parking corporate profits in tax-advantaged long-term assets until its needed. Google, for example, is a major owner of affordable housing developments.
This is what often happens after a speculative bubble bursts: all the folks who invested based on irrational exuberance get cleaned out of the market, and then assets are transferred to other investors who are generally much more prudent, often using spare cash that was sitting on the sidelines. In this case, the assets just happen to be where everybody lives.
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I think the problem with that logic is that the people at the 'top of the heap' - VC's, CEO's and the like are not the ones being priced out, mostly. Granted, a company might open an office somewhere else, but that's after it's already large and established. So you're kicking the marginal (in the economic sense) people out into marginal places where they have less access to what made the original area such a great pl…
maybe, i have neither a moral stance nor suggested solution for that. Seems to me that is a trait of capitalism/market economies; those who can pay the most get what they want.
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Delaware, Maryland, Virginia
DC, Maryland, Virgina. Also known as the Washington metropolitan area ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_metropolitan_area ). Delaware doesn't have much of a tech sector.
DelMarVa is the geographic peninsula east of Chesapeake Bay and west of Delaware Bay.
The ring of urban sprawl around the federal capital is "The DC Area". Unfortunately, "DC Metro" is the train system, and "DC Metropolis" is where Superman lives.
The only (well paying) tech jobs in Delaware would probably be working on internal systems for credit card companies in Wilmington. Possibly also registered agent software for CT or CSC, or some other business revolving around corporate registration and reporting.
I can't help thinking "Columbia Metropolis" would be a better name for the urban areas around the District of Columbia. But I don't have the authority to just change the names of things.
Portland resident here. What this article doesn't cover, is now locals are victim of gentrification. Rent prices are almost 2x, out of state buyers are throwing all cash offers on houses, and overall housing supply is low... I'm sure the commercial market is just as bad. Interesting times.
Same in Denver. Realtor told me 1/4 of properties don't make the MLS, they're bought with cash before they can get listed.
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When did San Francisco become the hot property? I know that the last time I was out there, about 2005, tech was still in the valley and SF proper was relatively low rent, bad neighborhoods, and no tech presence. Does this industry (to the extent that you can call AirBNB, Uber, and Twitter the same industry) really act like a flock of grackles or starlings, descending on a place, eating everything, and moving on?
It seems to be full of people who want to be near art and "cool" people. Unfortunately tech doesn't find a way to pay those creators of culture anything. If anything, the focus is on finding ways to make everything free. So tech moves in, enjoys the presence of creative culture they refuse to fund, but ultimately inflates real estate so much they drive that creative culture away. Rinse and repeat. If art and culture…
Yes, rents are high, but if you invest even a little bit of time you can find a fine residence in the Bay Area for a lot less than $4,500. I rent a two bedroom house in Oakland for $2,200. My commute is not too much longer than it would be if I live in certain parts of San Francisco. There's simply little advantage to living right in the heart of a major city. You have to ask yourself: "Instead of renting in a high-p…
The most insane part is the people who commute down to MTV (eg. Google) and only really get the benefit of the city on weekends anyway...