Pacaso ‘merely a cynical PR ploy’

EDITOR: Pacaso, the billion-dollar venture capitalist real estate company, has just announced it is giving

$100,000 to Burbank Housing for affordable housing. The full-page ad in last Friday’s Sonoma Index-Tribune heralding their charitable giving cost them $2,494.80. They have placed ads in many other major newspapers at a much higher cost. All in all, this for-profit business is spending tremendously more advertising their charitable giving program than they are donating. It is merely a cynical PR ploy.

Consider this: each of the eight shares of the home they are trying to sell on Old Winery Court is listed at $606,000. (Pacaso paid over $4,000,000 for the house, more than market value.) They are promising to donate $2,500 for each share sold. The median price of a home in Sonoma is well over $1,000,000. A modest apartment rents for close to $2,500 a month. What will $2,500 will buy in terms of affordable housing? A month’s rent? The $20,000 per home sold might pay for a kitchen remodel. How many affordable housing units will $100,000 build?

For more information on how to save our neighborhoods from Pacaso’s stealthy intrusion into our community, please go to stoppacasonow.com.

Nancy Gardner

Sonoma