There Goes the Neighborhood: Tech Workers' Silicon Valley Home Values Are Outpacing Neighbors'

SEATTLE, October 26, 2015 — Workers at Google, Facebook and Apple live in pricier homes than other Bay Area workers and have faster home value growth than other workers.

The average Apple worker now lives in a home that is more than five times more valuable than the average U.S. home. The gap has widened in the last five years. In 2010, the average Apple worker's home was worth three times as much as a typical U.S. home.

Bay Area home values are soaring, driven by a flood of well-paying jobs at technology companies. But Zillow found home-value appreciation for tech workers from these three companies outpaced that of their neighbors in Silicon Valley. To do the comparison, Zillow looked at census datai to see where employees at the tech companies' Silicon Valley headquarters live, and then compared their home values to those nearby.

"This analysis highlights the widening wealth gap between tech company employees and other U.S. workers – a gap that is putting increasing pressure on housing markets where tech companies are booming," said Zillow Chief Economist Dr. Svenja Gudell.

The analysis found:

• The typical worker at Apple's Cupertino, Calif. headquarters lives in a home that is worth about $1.14 millionii, about $241,000 (27 percent) more than the median home in the already-pricey San Jose metro area and $380,000 (50 percent) above the median home value in the San Francisco metro area.
• Workers at Google and Facebook headquarters – in Palo Alto and Menlo Park, Calif., respectively – lived in even more valuable homes. The median home value among Facebook workers is $1.25 million, and the median home value among Google workers is $1.28 million.
• The value gap between Silicon Valley techies' homes and their neighbors' homes has been widening recently, especially for Apple workers.
• Apple workers' home values took off after the first iPhone was released in June 2007, when Apple's stock price rose, increasing the wealth of many employees.
  • Prior to summer 2007, the typical Google employee lived in a home that was 37 percent more expensive than the average San Jose home; since summer 2007, that gap has widened to 39 percent.
  • Similarly, prior to summer 2007, the typical Facebook worker lived in a home that was 31 percent more expensive than the typical San Jose home; since summer 2007, that gap has widened to 33 percent.
  • Prior to summer 2007, the typical Apple worker lived in a home that was 13 percent more expensive than the typical San Jose home; since summer 2007 that gap has widened by 6.4 percentage points to 20 percent.

Zillow used data from the U.S. Census Bureau on where workers live and work across California's Bay Area, and combined it with Zillow's Living Database of All Homes to compute a median home value for workers who work at the Apple, Google, and Facebook campuses in the Silicon Valley.

Zillow

Zillow® is the leading real estate and rental marketplace dedicated to empowering consumers with data, inspiration and knowledge around the place they call home, and connecting them with the best local professionals who can help. In addition, Zillow operates an industry-leading economics and analytics bureau led by Zillow's Chief Economist Dr. Svenja Gudell. Dr. Gudell and her team of economists and data analysts produce extensive housing data and research covering more than 450 markets at Zillow Real Estate Research. Zillow also sponsors the quarterly Zillow Home Price Expectations Survey, which asks more than 100 leading economists, real estate experts and investment and market strategists to predict the path of the Zillow Home Value Index over the next five years. Zillow also sponsors the bi-annual Zillow Housing Confidence Index (ZHCI) which measures consumer confidence in local housing markets, both currently and over time. Launched in 2006, Zillow is owned and operated by Zillow Group, and headquartered in Seattle.