Uber Could Pay Oakland More Than $1M for Affordable Housing
When Uber Technologies converts Oakland's Sears Building, which the company bought last month to expand its Bay Area headquarters, it could funnel more than $1M in fees to the city for affordable housing.
If Uber uses about 330k SF of the 380k SF building for its offices, that could result in fees to the city of about $1.6M based on the current fee of $5.46 for every SF after 25k. Oakland's fee is far below that of San Francisco, which charges $24.03 for each SF of office space.
The city's jobs and housing impact fee will apply to portions of the building that are used for office space, so the ground-level retail and atrium space won't be included in the calculation, reports the San Francisco Business Times.
Uber purchased the Sears Building (now Uptown Station) for $123.5M last month, making it the largest tech company to expand into Oakland. When Uber moves into the building in two years, the company, valued at $50B, is expected to bring 3,000 new employees.
As Oakland works to seize upon the city's growth, government leaders are looking at new impact fees for market rate housing projects, which some developers worry could slow growth. [SFBT]
