Saturday, September 26, 2015

Is Oakland About to Explode?

With San Francisco rents, both office and residential, among the highest in the country, businesses and residents are looking across the bay.

Oakland residential rents climbed the fastest in the month of August of any city in the country, at an annualized clip of 20%.

The median rent for a one bedroom in the East Bay city is now $1,980, which, of course is very high, but nothing compared to the $3,500 per month median rent in "I lost my wallet" San Francisco.

On the corporate side, Pandora had located its global headquarters in the city, And Uber has just announced it is taking over an old Sears building, just a couple of blocks from Pandora.

Uber officials say that extensive renovations will be made to the seven-story building and that when completed the company will employ up to 3,000 people at the location.

Uber is also moving forward with plans for a two-building campus in San Francisco's Mission Bay.

Some say it's going to be the new Brooklyn and, indeed, a Brooklyn Deli has opened in the Pandoa-Uber area.



I happened to be in the area recently and stopped into the deli, which appears to be managed by Asians. Something you wouldn't see run by Asians in Brooklyn, NY.

Since I have something of a New York accent, I asked if I could get a discount, on the pastrami sandwich I was ordering, because my accent was adding authenticity to the place. No go on the discount. Typical deli owners.

-RW


3 comments:

  1. I can't get good phosphate free salami here in SC, so I order stuff routinely from Oakland via Amazon all the time. I hope they are able to keep their prices in line if their rent goes up, that stuff is as addictive as crack and I don't know that the withdrawal symptoms are.

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  2. "I happened to be in the area recently and stopped into the deli, which appears to be managed by Asians. Something you wouldn't see run by Asians in Brooklyn, NY."

    I am guessing you haven't been to Brooklyn lately, there are plenty. The only issue with them is that they are cheap with the cream cheese - don't understand what a NYC schmear is supposed to look like.

    Nearly got into a fight a couple years ago with a midtown Manhattan Pakistani bagel shop owner who wanted to charge me extra for more than a microscopically thin layer of cream cheese.
    I had asked for a little more than that from the food prep guy, he obliged without saying anything and then told the counter-guy (owner) when I went to pay that it was a bagel with "extra" cream cheese, yet from my perspective it was still meager but, whatevah. I debated him over this self-evident fact for a few moments then gave up, handed back the bagel, grabbed my cash back out of his hand, and left. He chased onto the street with the bagel asking what he was supposed to do with it now, demanding that I pay for it. My response: "Don't care, not my problem, eat it for lunch."

    The worst fast food in NYC these days are the Chinese-run Mexican places, though. The best way to describe: the food is like what you might imagine someone to make who had seen a picture of taco bell food once, years ago, but never even tasted it. The taco shells manage taste like egg rolls, even though they don't even sell egg rolls. It's all very confusing.

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