Mountain View Rents Reach New Highs

Mountain View is now the priciest city in Silicon Valley for renters.

Rents in the Peninsula city have climbed past pre-pandemic highs, with some new luxury one-bedrooms fetching approximately $5.75 per square foot, up from a previous peak of $5.50 per square foot, per CBRE data cited by the San Francisco Business Times. At that amount, the typical new one-bedrooms at the national average of about 735 square feet would lease for approximately $4,200 per month.

The new high for Mountain View comes as artificial intelligence companies flock to the Bay Area in droves, attracting thousands of workers and executives in need of housing. AI giant OpenAI is reportedly on the market for up to 500,000 square feet of offices in Silicon Valley, with Mountain View emerging as a top choice, according to real estate sources cited by the Business Times. As AI hiring picks up, so too does housing demand; AI job postings in Santa Clara County, for example, have jumped to 8 percent from 3 percent over the past three years.

In San Francisco, apartment rents have increased an average of 6 percent over the past year — more than double the 2.5 percent jump in New York City, per CoStar data cited by the New York Times. By contrast, rent growth nationwide has fallen to 0.5 percent year-over-year, while vacancy has increased to 4.4 percent and net absorption dropped to its lowest third-quarter levels since 2022, per CBRE data.

Last month, the Mountain View City Council rejected a proposal from Greystar Real Estate Partners that would increase housing supply in the city. The South Carolina-based firm has long planned to turn a J.P. Morgan Chase branch at 749 West El Camino Real into a 299-unit mixed-use development. Greystar requested to increase its construction timeline from two years to eight, but the city denied that request.

Under its state-mandated housing goals, the City of Mountain View must plan for 11,135 new housing units by 2031.

— Chris Malone Méndez