Ultra-ritzy enclave where nine local families have collective wealth of $638 billion

Daily Mail​

a day ago

Silicon Valley is the epicenter of America's tech hub, attracting many of the world's richest individuals and generating an estimated wealth of $638 billion.
But now it has emerged that the eye-watering sum is shared between just nine families.
And a new study conducted by San Jose State University concluded that the city's wealthiest households are only gaining wealth.
Their collective net worth was up by a staggering $136 billion from 2024, according to the recent data.
The annual report, titled the Silicon Valley Pain Index,is designed to measure 'personal and community distress' through data tracking structural inequalities in the region.
Silicon Valley refers to the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, including Santa Clara, San Mateo, the western edge of Alameda, and Scotts Valley in Santa Cruz.
It represents a high concentration of wealth and can be an increasingly difficult place for working and middle-class families to make ends meet.
Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg is among the ritzy residents, accounting for $253.5 billion of the area's wealth.
Zuckerberg's net worth is more than 20 times the wealth of the bottom 446,505 households in the area.
The Meta CEO purchased a five-house compound in the area, estimated to be worth a whopping $37million.
He bought a $7 million mansion in 2011 before buying the neighboring residences to create the compound.
The report also estimates that the region has $1.01 trillion of liquid wealth. Three companies based in Silicon Valley - Adobe, Alphabet (Google), and Meta comprise a combined net worth of $535 billion.
Even outside of the nine wealthiest families, the annual income needed to afford just a median-priced house is $370,000, up 54 percent in the last six years, according to the report.
The report also found that renters need to have an average annual income of $136,532 to afford an apartment at 30 percent of their take-home pay, representing the highest rents in the country.
In San Mateo County, a household annual income of $156,650 for a family of four is considered 'low, ' compared to the state average of $94,500.
Nearly 71 percent of homes sold in the area were priced around 1.92 million and were considered the 'median home price.'
The median home price in Santa Clara alone was 2.171 million in May, which is a 3.4 percent increase from last year.
The study doesn't explicitly state the nine families contributing to the mass concentration of wealth in addition to Zuckerberg, but Realtor.com listed Google's former CEO, Larry Page, as the second richest billionaire in the area.
Sergey Brin, who co-founded Google with Page and served as the president of Alphabet, is the third-wealthiest billionaire in the region.
Jensen Huang, the CEO of Nvidia, an artificial intelligence company, comes in fourth. Page and Zuckerberg live in Palo Alto, while Brin and Huang have properties in Los Altos Hills.
Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt is listed as the fifth-wealthiest billionaire in the region, with Dustin Moskovitz of Facebook as the sixth.
Financier George Roberts was listed seventh, while Laurence Powell Jobs of Apple came in eighth.
Venture capitalist John Doerr came in ninth, and Charles Schwab of Charles Schwab brokerage ranked tenth.
Silicon Valley is home to major enterprises including Apple, Alphabet, Chevron, Meta, Visa, and Wells Fargo.
The companies employ a significant portion of residents in the region, leading to the high concentration of wealth from executives and engineers reporting high incomes.
The success of these companies has solidified Silicon Valley as a wealthy enclave and the tech capital of the world, but the region has a long history of advancement.
The silicon chip, which is used in computerized machinery, was invented in the region, and electronics reporter Dan Hoefler coined the name 'Silicon Valley' in 1971.