Homes millbrae blog | homesmillbrae.com

Kyle Takes the Reins in Innovation Corridor

Posted on July 22, 2018 by

KYLE, TX—As one of the fastest growing municipalities in the innovation corridor between Austin and San Antonio, Kyle and Hays County are actively investing in the infrastructure needed to accommodate future growth. However, this is something of a rarity. While developers regularly build speculatively in Dallas and Houston, it is an exception rather than the rule in the Interstate 35 Corridor between Austin and San Antonio, GlobeSt.com learns.

Article source: http://www.globest.com/2018/07/22/kyle-takes-the-reins-in-innovation-corridor/?channel=markets§ion=national

Posted in SF Bay Area News | Tagged homes millbrae | Leave a comment

The fastest-growing Bay Area job zone isn’t SF or Silicon Valley — it’s the Tri-Valley

Posted on July 22, 2018 by

The East Bay’s Tri-Valley region saw jobs grow 35 percent between 2006 and 2016, outpacing San Francisco and Silicon Valley, according to a new report.

During the same period, San Francisco had 31 percent job growth, Silicon Valley had 19 percent and California overall had 8 percent.

The Tri-Valley cities of Danville, Dublin, Livermore, Pleasanton and San Ramon benefited from the presence of two federal laboratories, along with less expensive housing and office costs compared to the Bay Area’s urban centers, the report said. At the same time, the Tri-Valley and the rest of the Bay Area continue grappling with low housing supply and traffic congestion.

The business-backed Bay Area Council Economic Institute and Innovation Tri-Valley Leadership Group released the report.

“We’re not a bedroom community. We’ve got an urban-suburban meld,” said Dale Kaye, CEO of Innovation Tri-Valley Leadership Group. “It’s easier to recruit a workforce because of that.”

Total employment in the Tri-Valley surpassed 194,000 jobs in mid-2017. Around 19 percent of the jobs are in the tech sector, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Local companies have grown alongside Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, a research and development agency that works on nuclear weapons, bio-security and other defense projects with 6,500 employees and an annual budget of $1.7 billion, along with Sandia National Laboratory and its 1,200 employees.

Lawrence Livermore partners include Metal Improvement Co. and electron microscope maker IDES.

“Livermore is an epicenter of an ecosystem,” Kaye said.

The Tri-Valley is more educated than its neighbors, with 60 percent of residents holding a bachelor’s degree or higher in 2016, compared to half of Silicon Valley residents, according to the report.

Office space in the Tri-Valley is less than half as expensive as San Francisco, with average annual rents of $32 per square foot.

The Tri-Valley’s two major business parks, Bishop Ranch in San Ramon and Hacienda in Pleasanton, have seen growing tenants including SAP, Rodan + Fields and Roche Molecular. Bishop Ranch is also adding a 300,000-square-foot retail center designed by prominent architect Renzo Piano. The project will feature a movie theater, Equinox gym and new restaurants including Slanted Door.

People in the area “want to live in a place that supports and complements their active lifestyle,” said Josh Hitchcock, senior vice president at Sunset Development, which owns Bishop Ranch. “San Ramon and the East Bay are at the top of the list in terms of overall quality of life, top-ranked school districts, low crime rate, cost of living and availability of housing.”

Housing is also relatively affordable, with the Tri-Valley’s median home value below $1 million, compared to San Francisco’s $1.2 million. But the region is still expensive.

“It’s not like they’re affordable when you look at the rest of the country,” Kaye said. “There’s always an inventory problem.”

The report said traffic congestion is a major barrier to further growth in the Tri-Valley.

Interstate 580, which cuts through the Tri-Valley, saw the Bay Area’s highest increase in vehicle traffic in the past two years, and Interstate 680 also saw congestion increase, according to transit agencies. Bishop Ranch and other major employers have started running shuttles to BART in response, and Bishop Ranch is testing autonomous vehicles.

Micah Weinberg, president of the Bay Area Council Economic Institute, said building more housing near public transit is critical for the region’s future.

“These things go hand in hand. There’s really a need to build transit-oriented development and walkable communities,” Weinberg said. “I think Tri-Valley will remain relatively affordable, (but) no region in the Bay Area can rest on its home-building laurels.”

Roland Li is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: roland.li@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @rolandlisf

Article source: https://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/The-fastest-growing-Bay-Area-job-zone-isn-t-SF-13086071.php

Posted in SF Bay Area News | Tagged homes millbrae | Leave a comment

China’s Crypto Millionaires Are Using Bitcoin to Buy Real Estate Abroad

Posted on July 21, 2018 by

The chives growing in one crypto tycoon’s California mansion carry a hidden message.

Guo Hongcai, a beef salesman turned early bitcoin adopter from China’s Shanxi province, is one of many freshly minted millionaires funneling parts of their wealth out of the country by purchasing real estate abroad.

In April, Hongcai sold 500 bitcoin in the U.S. then used that money to buy a 100,000-square-foot mansion in Los Gatos, a 90-minute drive from San Francisco, California. His Rolls-Royce, also purchased with the fruits of bitcoin arbitrage, sits in the driveway close to a small chives garden.

“It’s very normal to sell bitcoin in the U.S. After selling bitcoin, you can just buy anything you want,” he told CoinDesk.

Guo calls this secondary residence his “Mansion of Chives,” because the vegetable is also Chinese slang for crypto investors who prove vulnerable to big sell-offs.

As Chinese regulators clamp down on industry business on the mainland, crypto millionaires are turning to foreign real estate markets to diversify their holdings. Some purchase property directly with crypto, others like Hongcai use bitcoin to gain foreign currencies without going through a bank.

The founders of one U.S. crypto real estate startup, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told CoinDesk roughly one-third of their prospective users hail from Asia, figures which include Chinese investors seeking tokenized property rights through Hong Kong securities brokers.

According to the South China Morning Post, real estate purchased in Hong Kong doesn’t require the same taxes and documentation as other financial assets held abroad. Chinese investment in foreign real estate, often through Hong Kong brokers, has been rising for years. Now early bitcoin adopters are utilizing new wealth for familiar patterns.

“The requests we have from them start at $50,000 or $100,000 up to, the latest one was $3 to $4 million for Silicon Valley,” Natalia Karayaneva, CEO of Propy, another crypto-powered real estate marketplace, told CoinDesk.

She added:

“We’re seeing that more and more people are willing to buy properties with cryptocurrencies because it’s getting easier to get their money out of the country using bitcoin, rather than establishing a bank account based in Hong Kong and getting their money out of the country using business channels.”

Crypto hubs

According to Karayaneva, the U.S. and the U.K. are the most sought-after locations for real estate, especially fintech hubs like London or California’s Bay Area.

“They were mostly interested in residential properties next to good education, like Stanford,” she said. “Also, they want to diversify. They want to have parts of their assets abroad in more stable countries.”

So far, around half of the traffic to Propy’s website comes from China, out of 50,000 monthly views.

It’s a trend that has implications far beyond China, though, especially in California, where, according to statistics gathered over a decade by ATTOM Data Solutions, nearly a quarter of all single-family homes are now purchased in all-cash transactions without a mortgage.

According to CEO Roy Dekel at SetSchedule, a California-based startup helping licensed real estate agents connect with buyers and homeowners, it’s more common for Chinese bitcoin veterans to convert cryptocurrency into cash than to buy property directly with it.

“We have noticed a drop in Chinese interest, but certain cities like Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York remain strong,” he told CoinDesk. “The ultra-wealthy Chinese have used this source as a diversification of investment.”

High rollers

On the other hand, Dekel also noticed “many blockchain enthusiasts” are buying second homes or investment properties, leading to an uptick in sellers interested in accepting cryptocurrencies directly from international buyers.

Since platforms like Propy are compliant across jurisdictions, the reason behind this trend may go beyond tax evasion, speaking to real pain points in legitimate markets.

In January, The New York Times asserted that China’s exorbitant housing market is “like a casino.” Further, Reuters reported property development restrictions continue to tighten, such as reduced subsidies for housing developers.

“In Beijing, only last year they saw a 40 percent rise in price,” Karayaneva said. “Historically, real estate investors from China are very active abroad because their own property market is going crazy.”

All things considered, Chinese buyers are hardly the only ones purchasing property with cryptocurrency. In 2017, Europeans used bitcoin to buy luxury apartments in Dubai’s Aston Crypto Plaza, a project spearheaded by British Baroness Michelle Mone.

Wherever it’s taking place, though, it has become increasingly clear that crypto wealth could have a real impact on global real estate patterns.

Door image via Shutterstock

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.

Article source: https://www.coindesk.com/china-bitcoin-crypto-millionaire-real-estate/

Posted in SF Bay Area News | Tagged homes millbrae | Leave a comment