I just wanted to know whether anyone had any knowledge about Stanford; it’s successes and failures and how it worked in practice. I’ve heard the waiting list is now so long that their system is essentially broken, but that’s just what I’ve heard.

As long as the prices of Silicon Valley homes for Apple, Yahoo, Google, eBay, etc employees cost a lot more than they do in Seattle/Redmond for Microsoft, Amazon, etc employees, I don’t think MS would have a strong incentive to implement something like this. Although, I think it would be great idea, especially since the era of golden handcuffs has turned to bronze.

According to Zillow, an average home in Mountain View, CA costs $300K more than one in Redmond, WA does and according to Glass Door (Barton’s other startup), your average Software Engineer at MS only makes about $5K less/year than their Valley compatriots.

Companies give a ton of money away to “worthy causes”.

What Employers don’t do enough of is help the existing employees with housing issues, which is a VERY worthy cause.

Kind of like the man that sends flowers to his girlfriend at work every Monday, to brighten her work week…until he marries her. Then its, “What’s for dinner!?”

For the record, “The University” in this post is not Stanford. Biliruben, whether it be a builder or a complex or a University, once the entity is stated, the discussion can’t continue. Lawsuits are filed when you start naming names and transparency is crushed in the process.

I once wrote a post about general builder practices, which is quite useful to the buying public. Then in the comments someone said “X builder does that!” Once you name an institution or a company…it hinders the process of free flow of information.

I say this for the benefit of all readers and people who comment. It’s why I sue generics like “Powers That Be” and “University”.

The World craves transparency, but there are things that will prevent it from growing:

1) Naming Names
2) McCain using the word in Presidential Debates

In fact, it doesn’t even have to be a gift. It could be a second mortgage. We have a University here in Chicago that offers 2nd mortgages to their employees which is a big deal now because banks have all but abandoned the second mortgage market.

Ironically, owning a home is usually people’s largest financial expense yet most employers do nothing to help lessen that burden which could be a huge benefit to employees and definitely increase employee/company loyalty.

Another idea is subsidizing the cost of ownership. In some way acting as a non-occupant co-borrower so the mortgage is affordable by most standards in high cost of living areas.

Heck, some companies might even consider just giving certain employees a low interest loan and just cutting out banks altogether.

I am sure there are plenty of innovative ways to encourage homeownership and lessen the burdern on their employees.

I think it’s a great idea and can see large, stable, operations getting involved in this. Your University’s idea is quite the hybrid approach (co-op and leasehold, yet still somewhat private) and will be a success as long as it remains pure in its mission (unlike the UBC leasehold endowment trust lands which have become luxury pads beyond the pay scale of most professors).

Sorry to confuse you, there’s nothing in it for me.

I was not involved in the purchase and sale of these homes. At present I am trying to assist some Powers That Be in acquiring land for “an idea”. My premise is “their idea” is incorrect, and so I am exploring “ideas”. You can’t go get something if you don’t first know what you are going to do with that something. So I can’t…or won’t help them “go get it” if I can’t buy into the “they shoud have it” and I suspect that is partly the reason why they haven’t been able to “get” enough of “it” to date.

Back to the University and my role. The “homeowners” started thinking this way. OK, I’m going to get 5% to 8% appreciation no matter what while the homes in the area are appreciating at a higher rate. If I’m going to get the same appreciation whether I run the place into the ground or maintain it well, I may as well run it into the ground.

Also the HOA dues were supposed to maintain the pool and common areas, but the owners spent the money on parties and other things, thinking the University will have to shell out the money to fix the pool eventually out of safety concerns. They started viewing everythng as “a company benefit” and using in a way that forced the employer to pour in more “benefit”.

It’s a shame really…could have been a great concept if the owners were a bit more responsible and utopian in their efforts. It’s still there and I’m sure it’s just fine without me, but the concept that people would intentionally ruin real estate was just not my cup of tea.

As to “The University” there were a few pitfalls as in people who have limited and guaranteed capture of appreciation, sometimes fall short and “utopian principles” did not prevail. A good thing can turn bad because human nature is sometimes not a good thing.