San Francisco Startup Sees Large Demand for Sleeping Pods That Price $700 a Month

A startup in San Francisco that rents out bunkbed-style pods giant sufficient to suit a twin mattress is overwhelmed with demand for its $700-a-month residing quarters. The corporate, Brownstone Shared Housing, operates out of a former financial institution in downtown San Francisco. The pods are 3.5ft-by-4ft-by-6.5ft with a privateness curtain; lease contains web, utilities, and entry to shared bogs and a kitchen.

The corporate, which has been in operation for a number of years, says 300 people have used a web-based software to use for its remaining 17 beds. Brownstone additionally operates the same shared residing area in Palo Alto close to the campus of Stanford College. Most of the people whom reside in these areas are aspiring startup founders, however it’s not a requirement and Brownstone has marketed itself as providing reasonably priced housing to individuals from completely different backgrounds.

The corporate was flagged final 12 months by San Francisco officers for unauthorized conversion of an workplace constructing for residential. San Francisco officers have allowed current residents to stay within the constructing, however they nonetheless can’t welcome new tenants. Brownstone submitted a brand new approval software hoping to transform the constructing to residential use again in July of this 12 months.

Communal residing conditions usually are not uncommon in San Francisco. For years there have existed “hacker houses” throughout the town the place broke startup founders with a dream have shacked up in shut quarters with others to economize and probably meet like-minded people. A few of these areas have shut down below a flurry of controversy, nonetheless — Launch Home, which was a mix startup accelerator and shared residing startup — closed in 2022 following an exposé by Vox which unearthed a collection of misconduct and sexual assault allegations.

And again in Could, a series of tweets went viral by which a girl described how community-style homes within the Bay Space shaped round an curiosity in AI had a “local weather that was like a fratty LSD model of 2008 Wall Road bankers, which bodes in poor health for AI security,” saying that girls have been taken benefit of and coerced into uncomfortable conditions by which they really feel a have to take part with a view to be included within the AI race.

Brownstone has not been the topic of any such allegations.

Exhibits like HBO’s Silicon Valley have glamorized most of these residing conditions. And to make certain, the reasonably priced housing disaster would require a complete host of artistic options. However if you combine maladjusted, socially awkward younger males with ladies in a co-ed residing scenario, there’s sure to be one thing go awry. And paying $700 a month to reside in a cramped pod with a privateness curtain will not be ideally suited for different causes. Should you’re a younger and sexless male it is perhaps effective for a short while. However individuals ought to have the ability to go residence at night time to their very own personal abode.