Hillsborough home prices jumped 18% over the past year, and a Burlingame real estate agent says artificial intelligence money is a major reason why.
A Redfin report published Thursday, July 9, estimates that employees of OpenAI and Anthropic could collectively afford to buy about 29% of all homes in the San Francisco metro area once the two AI giants go public. That's roughly $198 billion in after-tax employee equity chasing a regional housing stock Redfin valued at $692 billion in 2024. The brokerage itself calls the analysis "purely hypothetical and not a realistic representation of where IPO proceeds will go," but for Burlingame and Hillsborough buyers, the pressure is already showing up at open houses.
Raziel Ungar, a Compass agent based on Chapin Avenue in Burlingame and the city's top-selling Realtor every year from 2014 to 2025 per Multiple Listing Service records, told the San Mateo Daily Journal he has worked with at least 15 AI-industry clients so far in 2026. Hillsborough prices climbed 18% year over year as of mid-2026, Ungar said, citing MLS data.
Homes priced around $2 million are drawing more competition than in previous years, Ungar said.
"If you want to buy a three-bedroom home in Burlingame under $3 million, your median square footage is going to be around 1,170," Ungar told the Daily Journal on Tuesday, July 14. "That's how small your house is going to be."
The county's median home price hit $2,401,000 in May 2026, up 9.1% from May 2025, according to California Association of Realtors data.
The IPO pipeline
Both companies filed confidential IPO paperwork with the SEC in June 2026, according to CNBC. Anthropic, last valued at $965 billion after a funding round in May 2026, could hit public markets as soon as October 2026. OpenAI is targeting a 2027 debut.
Redfin's analysis estimates OpenAI employees would net about $135 billion after taxes, enough to theoretically purchase 20% of all homes in the San Francisco metro. Anthropic employees would net roughly $63 billion, covering about 9%. Redfin modeled the Anthropic equity figure rather than drawing on disclosed numbers.
Some of that wealth is already liquid. More than 600 OpenAI employees collectively sold $6.6 billion in shares through secondary transactions in October 2025, an average of about $11 million per employee, according to Inman. Anthropic employees sold about $6 billion in shares in early 2026.
What it means locally
Ungar said the trend lines up with what he sees on the ground. "Everything that I've read as a consumer about the [effects of] AI, I'm experiencing as an agent," he told the Daily Journal.
Post-IPO lockup periods of up to 180 days could delay any buying wave. The next milestone for the local market: Anthropic's IPO, expected as early as October 2026.
