The 10 Best Cities For Millennial Renters – And The Five Worst

NEW YORK ( MainStreet) — Chew on this: in much of the country, it is cheaper to own than to rent. Read that again. A RealtyTrac survey of some 473 U.S. counties found that in 68% it is cheaper to buy than to rent. But there is a big exception. In many of the counties that are most attractive to Millennials, renting is significantly cheaper. That makes sense, because, so far, Millennials are shaping up as renters, and they are delaying home purchases.

Per RealtyTrac numbers, in the 25 counties with the biggest jump in Millennial population in the period 2007 to 2013, fair market rental rates for a three bedroom dwelling average 30% of household income. Buying in those markets requires 36% of household income. In some markets, the spreads are even greater. Renting in Hudson County, N.J. – directly across from Manhattan, in Hoboken, Jersey City, Weehawken, etc. – runs around 33% of median household income. Buying takes a much bigger bite, around 47% of income to purchase a median priced home. Hudson County, by the way, ranks sixth in RealtyTrac’s tally of the places with the biggest influx of Millennials. Millennial population there grew by 35.67% in the 2007 to 2013 period.

Where else exactly are Millennials flocking? And where are they fleeing? Note: it is not cheap just about anywhere. RealtyTrac analysis pegs the average fair market rent in the top 25 counties for Millennials at $1,459. That’s 19% above the national average. But some towns that draw Millennials are dramatically more affordable than many others.

Read more: http://business-news.thestreet.com/philly/story/the-10-best-cities-millennial-renters-and-the-five-worst/1?page=1

Report: Bright Millennials Flocking To Center City

Map of Pennsylvania highlighting Philadelphia County (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The number of educated millennials living in Center City ballooned 78 percent between 2000 and 2010, according to a report released Monday.

“The Young and Restless and the Nation’s Cities,” published by cityobservatory.org, found that 25 to 34 year olds with at least a bachelor’s degree have been flocking to major metropolitan areas, fueling economic growth and stimulating urban revitalization.

Philadelphia ranked sixth among major cities which have attracted young college graduates to their booming city centers. New York City topped the list followed by San Francisco, Washington D.C., Chicago and Boston.

Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/news/Report_Number_of_educated_millennials_living_in_Center_City_skyrockets.html#MqLbhuE2OgqeDAdH.99

Pittsburgh Renting Rates Rising Quickly

A map of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with its neighborhoods labeled. For use primarily in the list of Pittsburgh neighborhoods. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

If it seems as though rental prices in Pittsburgh have been in a bull market over the past several years, that’s because they have.

While large metro areas like New York and San Francisco have grabbed headlines for their sky-high rental prices, Pittsburgh’s rental market is actually rising at a faster rate than New York’s, according to a study from personal finance website NerdWallet.

“We were looking at growth rates, rather than cities with the highest rents, and Pittsburgh is in a rapid economic growth period now,” said Divya Raghavan, a senior analyst for NerdWallet in San Francisco. “While New York and San Francisco are already well-established top cities in the U.S., Pittsburgh is considered an up and coming city.”

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/business/finance/2014/04/18/Pittsburgh-renting-rates-rising-quickly/stories/201404180004#ixzz2zGE35Ub1

Mass Transit Ridership In 2013 Highest In 57 Years

Ridership on buses, trains and subways in 2013 was the highest in 57 years, the American Public Transportation Association said Monday.

The growth in transit ridership continued a 20-year trend attributed to higher gasoline prices, a shift by young adults away from automobiles, increased use of mobile technology, and the increasing allure of urban areas.

“There is a fundamental shift going on in the way we move about our communities,” said APTA president Michael Melaniphy.

In 2013, riders made 10.7 billion trips on U.S. public transit systems, up 1.1 percent from 2012. That was the most since 1956.

Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/business/transportation/20140311_Mass_transit_ridership_in_2013_highest_in_57_years.html#4DxdR5HbEf6VkPFv.99

Wealth Gap Is Widest In Some Affluent US Cities

WASHINGTON (AP) – The gap between the wealthy and the poor is most extreme in several of the United States’ most prosperous and largest cities.

The economic divides in Atlanta, San Francisco, Washington, New York, Chicago and Los Angeles are significantly greater than the national average, according to a study released Thursday by the Brookings Institution, the Washington-based think tank. It suggests that many sources of both economic growth and income inequality have co-existed near each other for the past 35 years.

These cities may struggle in the future to provide adequate public schooling, basic municipal services because of a narrow tax base and “may fail to produce housing and neighborhoods accessible to middle-class workers and families,” the study said.

“There’s something of a relationship between economic success and inequality,” said Alan Berube, a senior fellow at Brookings. “These cities are home to some of the highest paying industries and jobs in the country.”

Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/business/homepage/20140220_ap_9abeed9da7e24c51a0a078a9ca8c73b9.html#fRdwGmPM2m6ZEQji.99

Shirley Temple, Iconic Child Star, Dies At 85

Screenshot of Shirley Temple from the film The Little Princess (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

WOODSIDE, CA (AP) — Shirley Temple, the dimpled, curly-haired child star who sang, danced, sobbed and grinned her way into the hearts of Depression-era moviegoers, publicist Cheryl Kagan. She was 85.

Temple, known in private life as Shirley Temple Black, died at her home near San Francisco.

A talented and ultra-adorable entertainer, Shirley Temple was America’s top box-office draw from 1935 to 1938, a record no other child star has come near. She beat out such grown-ups as Clark Gable, Bing Crosby, Robert Taylor, Gary Cooper and Joan Crawford.

Read more: http://timesleader.com/news/local-news/1186586/Shirley-Temple-iconic-child-star-dies-at-85

Ozone Hole Stabilizing But Not Shrinking Yet

English: Ozone Hole (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The hole in the ozone layer is stabilizing but will take until about 2070 to fully recover, according to new research by NASA scientists.

The assessment comes more than two decades after the Montreal Protocol, the international treaty that banned chlorofluorocarbons and other compounds that deplete the ozone layer, which shields the planet from harmful ultraviolet rays.

Levels of chlorine in the atmosphere are falling as a result of the treaty, but have not yet dropped below the threshold necessary to have a shrinking effect on the ozone hole that forms each year over Antarctica, according to scientists at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. They presented their findings last week at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco.

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/news/nation/2013/12/16/Ozone-hole-stabilizing-but-not-shrinking-yet/stories/201312160113#ixzz2neqxGjk1

San Francisco Plane Crash: Crew Tried To Abort Landing

The doomed Asiana Airlines jetliner had its throttles set to idle and was moving so slowly that it nearly stalled before it smashed into a seawall bordering a San Francisco International Airport runway, federal investigators said Sunday.

The crew tried to abort the landing and avert the disaster, which killed two teenage passengers and injured dozens of others, but it was too late, according to a preliminary review of flight data and cockpit communications by the National Transportation Safety Board.

The crew sought to accelerate 7 1/2 seconds before impact, investigators said.  Three seconds later, a vibrating “shaker stick” in the cockpit signaled an impending stall – a condition in which the wings lose lift and a plane can’t be controlled.

And with 1 1/2 seconds left, someone on board alerted an air traffic controller that the Boeing 777 jetliner would try to pull up and circle around.  It could not, and at 11:27 a.m. Saturday it bounced and skidded across the ground, losing its tail before it came to rest on the side of Runway 28L.

Read more:  http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/SF-plane-crash-Crew-tried-to-abort-landing-4650990.php

2 Killed, 49 Badly Hurt In San Francisco International Airport Plane Crash

Map of California (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

SAN FRANCISCO — Two people were killed and 49 people were seriously injured Saturday when a Boeing 777 passenger jetliner arriving from Seoul crashed and caught fire while landing at San Francisco International Airport, officials said.

The plane, Asiana Airlines Flight 214 with 307 people onboard, slammed to earth at 11:27 a.m. and came to rest on the side of Runway 28L, one of four runways at SFO, said Lynn Lunsford, a spokeswoman with the Federal Aviation Administration.  The plane appeared to make impact short of the runway and then spin as it careened across the ground – losing its tail and leaving a trail of debris.

There were 291 passengers and 16 crew members aboard.  Two people were killed, 49 were seriously hurt, another 132 suffered lesser injuries and went to area hospitals, and one person was unaccounted for, SFO spokesman Doug Yakel said at an evening press conference at the airport.  The other 123 people onboard were not injured.

The injuries “are consistent with the types of injuries you would see in a plane crash or fire,” said Rachael Kagan, a spokeswoman at San Francisco General Hospital, where five people were in critical condition. “Many burns, fractures and internal injuries.”

Read more:  http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/2-killed-49-badly-hurt-in-SFO-plane-crash-4650259.php

In San Francisco, High-Rises By The Bay

The San Francisco Peninsula (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

ROUGHLY two decades ago, during an earlier Internet start-up boom, many entrepreneurs and fast-typing coders and engineers set up shop in a still-gritty area of this city:  South of Market Street.

The young tech crowd rented — and sometimes bought — in commercial buildings in this former warehouse area, converting them into “work-live” spaces where they operated their nascent companies and slept (once in awhile).

The boom-and-bust cycles in the tech sector move quickly, and the pace of constant reinvention and innovation is relentless.

The same is true of tastes in real estate.  Today a new generation of tech dreamers is back in the South of Market area.  But this time they are breathing life into a start-up wave not previously seen in San Francisco:  high-rise condo living.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/21/realestate/in-san-francisco-glass-and-steel-condos-rising-by-the-bay.html?pagewanted=1&_r=0&hpw

How Small Is Too Small?

Editor’s note:  Very interesting!

Most people see a parking space and promptly back up into it; Tim McCormick sees one and thinks, “I could live here.”

Who would willingly choose to live in something with the footprint of a parking space (8x10x16 feet)?  Millions already do, argues McCormick, a communications consultant: bedrooms, dorm rooms, motel rooms, hostels, mobile homes and the like.  “I myself live comfortably in a converted one-car garage of 200 square feet,” he says, “which allows me to live inexpensively near downtown in super-expensive Palo Alto.”

In cities where space is at a mind-boggling premium, McCormick’s idea of taking up residence in a parking space — in what he refers to as a “Houselet” — isn’t all that far-fetched.  It may in fact be more appealing than the so-called “hacker hostels” that got a lot of buzz earlier this summer. Essentially apartments that house herds of would-be startup entrepreneurs willing to pay market rate to live in near-migrant-worker conditions, hacker hostels are proliferating in cities like San Francisco and New York where work culture calls for 24/7 commitments and lots of food-truck takeout (which no doubt inspired upLIFT’s prefab parking pods for the city).

These apartments are less living spaces than crash pads with a social networking component.

Read more: http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/19/how-small-is-too-small/

Downtown Pittsburgh – A Landlord Market As Occupancy Rates And Rents Soar

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Downtown Pittsburgh skyscrapers are filling up fast.  Occupancy rate in many buildings is in the 90 percent range.  This is a drastic change from a few years ago when many buildings had high vacancy rates.  Owners were making deals with tenants to keep them.

Now landlords are naming their price and tenants are willing to pay the asking rates.  Several large buildings have come off the market after investors decided they could not reinvest anywhere else and get a better return than in downtown Pittsburgh.  Pittsburgh, New York and San Francisco had the largest increases in average office rents in the fourth quarter of 2010.

The Gateway Center Complex (four buildings) was recently taken off the market as well as the 32-story EQT Tower.  The owners decided retaining ownership was in their best interest given Pittsburgh’s bullish market.

Eleven Stanwix Street has gone from a 50 percent to a 94 percent occupancy rate.  The building is now up for sale but the owner is still receiving calls to lease space.  The Oliver Building and the Regional Enterprise Tower are also for sale.  The USX Tower (Pittsburgh’s tallest building at 64-stories) is in the process of being sold and has reached a tentative agreement with the new group of investors.  The purchase price is around $250 million according to the Wall Street Journal.

As occupancy rates climb and office space becomes scare, tenants are willing to pay higher rates to be in a full building (which is characterized as being in the upper 80 to lower 90 percentage leased category).

Bryn Mawr’s Yangming Chinese Restaurant Rated Number One In America

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20 years ago, Michael Wei opened a formal Chinese restaurant in Bryn Mawr.  It also featured fusion cuisine.  Neither of these concepts was associated with Chinese cuisine then.  Chef Wei took a huge risk. 

Wei received the prestigious award in San Francisco, where the Top 100 Chinese Restaurants Awards was first started in 2004.  Yangming won for best overall-excellence.  In this category, restaurants are judged on consistency, quality, taste, variety, décor, atmosphere, customer service, cleanliness, presentation and value.  WOW! 

It is estimated there are 50,000 Chinese Restaurants in the United States.

If you are a lover of great Asian/American cuisine, a trip to Yangming should be in your future.

Yangming is located at 1051 Conestoga Boulevard, Bryn Mawr, PA 19010.

Voice: (610) 527-3500

Website: http://www.yangmingrestaurant.com/index.htm

McNabb Asks To Be Released From Redskins Contract

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That certainly didn’t last long.  Donovan McNabb wants out.  

Anybody remember “Please Release Me” by Engelbert Humperdinck? 

Now that Mike Singletary has been fired as head coach of the 49ers, there is some speculation that good old number 5 might end up in San Francisco.  Time will tell.

Will Donovan leave his heart in San Francisco?