All the local papers are running stories commemorating the 100th anniversary of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.
The Mercury News has extensive coverage, with slide shows, fault maps, and history of the quake.
Vietnam startups
The Merc has a story about software startups in Vietnam.
“We want to have the culture of Silicon Valley in Vietnam,” said valley veteran Kevin Nguyen, co-founder and chief technical officer at Global CyberSoft, which employs more than 300 tech workers in the Saigon Software Park.
Be careful what you wish for, Kevin.
There are about 100 software companies with at least 50 employees in Ho Chi Minh City, and 200 software companies throughout the country. The young software industry employs some 32,000 workers…
Costs are also lower. A Vietnamese software engineer earns between $3,500 and $13,000. In India, the pay range is $7,000 to $30,000, while valley engineers pull in between $79,000 and $125,000.
Market still crazy, but no longer ‘insane’
How boring. Home prices in Santa Clara county set another record . But wait! What’s this? Prices increased less in the past year than expected. In fact, the yearly appreciation hasn’t been this low since October 2003.
Santa Clara County’s median home price hit a record $735,000 in March but the double-digit annual appreciation of years past is slowing, providing further evidence of a cooling real estate market.
The median price of a previously owned house was […] up nearly 11 percent from March 2005.
Just when I was going to start looking again
Rental rates rebounding in valley
Landlords appear to be gaining more leverage in once-slumping markets such as the Bay Area, where a revived high-tech industry and higher home prices are fueling rental demand.
Rents in Santa Clara County […] averaged $1,359, a 5.8 percent increase. In the five-county San Francisco-Oakland area, rents averaged $1,374 in March, a 5 percent yearly increase, RealFacts reported.