Palo Alto, California

Palo Alto is a city where one landowner, Stanford University, holds the research park, the shopping centre and the hospital ground, and California keeps no open register of who owns the rest.

8 buildings · 5 with an owner established · 13 sources · 4 tier B · 4 tier A · prepared 2026-10-31

Can you find out who owns it?

California has no public register of title. Santa Clara County's Assessor values every parcel under Proposition 13, which resets a property's taxable value to its purchase price only when ownership changes, and the County Clerk-Recorder holds the deeds; neither publishes owners' names as open data, and both sites refused our automated requests. A deed can be looked up at the Recorder one document at a time. The County publishes a top-ten taxpayer list, and the City's annual financial report names its principal property taxpayers.

Is ownership public?Public, but one paid search at a time

Cost of one title searchNot available at any price

Bulk ownership dataNone published

Sale pricesNo transaction data published

The marquee buildings

The towers that set the tone of the core, and who holds them. A price is the price a document states, on the date it states — not an estimate of what the building is worth now.

Building	Use	Owner	Owner type	Last price paid
Stanford Research Park Page Mill Rd, Hanover St, Hillview Ave, Porter Dr and Arastradero Rd, southwest of El Camino Real 10 million sq ft on 700 acres	Office	Leland Stanford Junior University (Stanford University) Wikipedia: established 1951 'as a joint initiative between Stanford University and the City of Palo Alto'; infobox 'Owner Stanford University, Landlord Stanford University'; the park 'covers a 700-acre (280-hectare) area and has 10 million square feet of commercial real estate'. Tenants build and occupy on Stanford land (HP's headquarters, 1501 Page Mill Rd, is here). The City's FY2025 ACFR ranks 'Leland Stanford Jr. University' first among property taxpayers at $7.40B taxable assessed value, 15.0% of the city's $49.34B (FY2016: $3.95B, 13.4%); the roll does not split that figure by site.	Institution	—B Wikipedia
Stanford Shopping Center El Camino Real at Sand Hill Rd 1,322,323 sq ft (Simon 10-K); 1,347,935 sq ft GLA (Wikipedia)	Retail	Simon Property Group 94.4% (buildings), on a ground lease from Stanford expiring 2064 Simon's 2025 10-K property table: 'Stanford Shopping Center CA Palo Alto (San Jose) Ground Lease (2064) 94.4% (10) Acquired 2003 98.8% 1,322,323', anchors Neiman Marcus, Bloomingdale's, Nordstrom, Macy's. Footnote (10): 'We receive substantially all the economic benefit of the property due to a preference or advance.' Wikipedia: the university 'only owns the land and not the actual buildings'; Simon 'leases the underlying land from the university under a 51-year lease', with annual rent 'equal to 25% percent of the center's net profits'. Simon Property Group is also on the City's list of ten largest water customers (ACFR).	REIT	$333M 2003 Wikipedia: in 2003 Stanford's board of trustees 'agreed to sell the center for $333 million to Simon Property Group'. The 10-K says 'Acquired 2003'. B U.S. SEC EDGAR
Stanford Hospital (Stanford Health Care main hospital and Hoover Pavilion) 500 Pasteur Dr	Institutional	Not established the source would not open Wikipedia: 'The main hospital building and the Hoover Pavilion are within the city limits of Palo Alto'; about 610 licensed beds; the hospital opened in 1959 'co-owned with the city of Palo Alto' as Palo Alto-Stanford Hospital Center and 'was purchased by the university in 1968'; a new inpatient building opened in 2019. Who holds title to the present buildings and land today was not read on any record: the County Assessor's site refused our requests. The ACFR lists Stanford (University and Healthcare) as Palo Alto's largest employer (18,000) and carries a Stanford University Medical Center development-agreement fund.	Not established	—A Wikipedia
Palo Alto Civic Center (City Hall) 250 Hamilton Ave	Civic	City of Palo Alto The ACFR is issued from 250 Hamilton Ave. Note 8: the 2021 Public Safety Building Certificates of Participation ($101.5M, maturing 2050) are secured by lease payments from the City's General Fund to the Public Improvement Corporation; 'The leased property is the City's Civic Center' until the new Public Safety Building, nearing completion in FY2025, becomes the leased property.	Government	—A City of Palo Alto, Administrative Services Department
Palo Alto Airport (PAO) Embarcadero Rd, Baylands 102 acres	Civic	City of Palo Alto ACFR: in December 2010 the Council accepted an Airport Business Plan and created the Airport Enterprise Fund 'to facilitate the transition of PAO control from the County of Santa Clara to the City'; $2.2M of General Fund advances remained at June 2025; the City capitalised a $41.2M apron reconstruction. Wikipedia: the airport 'covers 102 acres' and 'In 2015 the City of Palo Alto took over operations from Santa Clara County, after a 50-year lease had ended.'	Government	—B City of Palo Alto, Administrative Services Department
Alexandria Stanford Life Science District 3160, 3165, 3170 and 3181 Porter Dr; 3301-3307 and 3330 Hillview Ave (Stanford Research Park) 705,787 RSF in 9 properties	Office	Alexandria Real Estate Equities Alexandria's 2025 10-K lists the campus in its Greater Stanford submarket (705,787 RSF, 9 properties, 86.8% occupied), 'which we acquired in 2022 and for which we are evaluating business strategy'; a lease with Cloud Software Group (formerly TIBCO) was in place at acquisition. The 10-K does not state the price. Two Alexandria-named entities, ARE-San Francisco 80 LLC ($312.0M) and ARE-San Francisco 69 LLC ($153.7M), are Palo Alto's No. 3 and No. 4 property taxpayers in FY2025 (ACFR); the ACFR does not say which parcels they hold.	REIT	—B U.S. SEC EDGAR
HP Inc. global headquarters 1501 Page Mill Rd (Stanford Research Park)	Office	Not established the source would not open HP's fiscal 2025 10-K: 'Our global headquarters, including our principal executive offices, are located at 1501 Page Mill Road, Palo Alto'. The 10-K does not say whether HP owns or leases the building; the land is in Stanford Research Park, which Stanford owns (s3). Hewlett Packard is among the City's ten largest electricity and water customers (ACFR).	Not established	—A U.S. SEC EDGAR
VA Palo Alto Health Care System, Palo Alto Division Palo Alto (street address not read on a source)	Institutional	Not established the source would not open Wikipedia: a 'United States Department of Veterans Affairs healthcare group' operating 'nearly 900 beds, including three nursing homes and a 100-bed homeless domiciliary'. The ACFR lists it as the city's No. 5 employer (1,323) and the Veterans Administration Hospital among the ten largest electricity and water customers. No source opened states who holds title (federal ownership is likely but was not read on a record).	Not established	—A Wikipedia

The core land

The most valuable ground in the city, and what the public record says about it.

From the City's FY2025 ACFR statistical section (source California Municipal Statistics, Inc.), as of 30 June 2025. These are Proposition 13 taxable values, which reset only on a sale, so long-held property is assessed far below market and exempt Stanford, school and public land is left out.

City taxable assessed value$49.34B; 20,982 parcels

FY2025, up from $29.42B in FY2016. Residential $36.07B (73.1%), non-residential $12.98B, vacant $0.28B.

Largest taxpayer$7.40B - Leland Stanford Jr. University (15.0%)

ACFR principal-taxpayer table, FY2025; the next largest, Google, is $385.5M.

Professional/office parcels$8.23B; 597 parcels

16.7% of taxable value; commercial $2.28B (442 parcels), industrial/R&D $2.27B (220).

Single-family assessed valueMedian $1,459,908; average $1,982,029

15,169 taxable improved single-family parcels. Prop 13 at work: 1,737 houses (11.5%) are assessed under $200,000, while 1,705 assessed at $4M or more carry 34.5% of all single-family value.

Who owns the town

At this scale the significant owner is rarely a trust or a fund: it is one or two local holding companies, a family in its second or third generation, and often the land around the town rather than the buildings in it.

One private institution dominates Palo Alto's tax roll: Leland Stanford Jr. University carries 15.0% of the city's taxable assessed value, nearly five times the next nine taxpayers together ($1.52B), because the research park, the shopping-centre ground and other campus-edge land within city limits are Stanford's. The City is the largest public landholder, with 4,018 acres of open space alone, plus its own electric, gas, water and fiber utilities and the airport. Owner counts and acreages per entity could not be computed: the County Assessor's site refused automated requests and no parcel roll with owner names is published.

Name	Type	Holdings (sources as stated)
Leland Stanford Junior University (Stanford University) No. 1 property taxpayer in FY2025 and FY2016 ($3.95B, 13.4%) in the City's ACFR (source California Municipal Statistics). Owner and landlord of Stanford Research Park (700 acres, 10M sq ft, Wikipedia) and ground lessor of Stanford Shopping Center (Simon 10-K: ground lease to 2064). The figure is taxable value only; exempt academic and hospital property is not in it.	Institution	$7.40B taxable assessed value, 15.0% of the city (FY2025); 700-acre research parkB City of Palo Alto, Administrative Services Department
City of Palo Alto ACFR capital-asset statistics. The City also runs its own water, electric, fiber-optic, gas, wastewater, storm-drain, refuse and airport enterprises: 216 miles of overhead and 294 of underground electric lines, 231 miles of water mains, 211 of gas mains. The 126-acre former Palo Alto Landfill, capped by November 2015, is now Byxbee Park. Williams Park is leased to the non-profit Museum of American Heritage. The Civic Center is leased to the City's Public Improvement Corporation under the 2021 COPs.	Government	4,018 acres open space, 175 acres parks, 181-acre golf course, 37 parks (FY2025)A City of Palo Alto, Administrative Services Department
Santa Clara County Housing Authority ACFR Note 7: in September 2017 the City entered an agreement with the Housing Authority 'for the acquisition of Buena Vista Mobile Home Park'; the City loaned SCCHA $14.5M at 3% simple interest, payable by 29 September 2092, and is entitled to 26% of residual receipts.	Government	Buena Vista Mobile Home Park (acquired with a $14.5M City loan, 2017)A City of Palo Alto, Administrative Services Department
Palo Alto Unified School District Named only as one of the City's ten largest water customers in the ACFR; its school sites are tax-exempt and do not appear in the taxable land-use table. Parcel count and acreage were not readable.	Government	not establishedA City of Palo Alto, Administrative Services Department
Government/social/institutional parcels (all owners) ACFR land-use table, 2024-25: of 121 government/social/institutional parcels, only 56 are taxable. Tax-exempt property is excluded from the table, so public ownership is understated.	Government	121 parcels, $69.8M taxableA City of Palo Alto, Administrative Services Department

Who builds the houses

New-home building in this market: the volume, and the firms behind it. Ownership of a builder matters as much as its volume — a private-equity platform and a family firm behave differently.

Palo Alto builds very little housing, and almost all of it is single houses: the Census Bureau counted 196 single-family units ($78.7M) and 3 buildings of five or more units (18 units, $4.8M) permitted in the city in 2025, with no two- to four-unit buildings. No builder table could be assembled: the County Assessor's roll, which would show lots held by builders, refused automated requests, and no league table of Palo Alto homebuilders was found. The housing stock itself: 15,241 single-family parcels assessed at $30.07B (61% of the city's taxable value) and 3,075 condominium and townhouse parcels ($3.17B).

Commercial landlords

The commercial side, counted separately from housing: who holds the office, retail and industrial floor area.

Palo Alto's commercial wealth is office and research space, almost all of it in Stanford Research Park and along Page Mill Road and El Camino Real. Professional/office parcels alone are assessed at $8.23B (597 parcels), more than commercial ($2.28B) and R&D/industrial ($2.27B) together. Four listed REITs report Palo Alto buildings in their 2025 10-Ks; the rest of the top-ten taxpayer list is single-asset LLCs whose sponsors the ACFR does not name.

Name	Type	Floor area or taxable value
Alexandria Real Estate Equities 2025 10-K, Greater Stanford: Alexandria Stanford Life Science District (705,787 RSF, 9 properties), 3412-3460 Hillview Ave (340,103, 5), 2475 and 2625-2631 Hanover St and 1450 Page Mill Rd (198,548, 3), 2100 and 2200 Geng Rd (62,526, 2); the sum is ours. ARE-San Francisco 80 LLC ($312.0M) and ARE-San Francisco 69 LLC ($153.7M) are the No. 3 and No. 4 taxpayers (ACFR).	REIT	1,306,964 RSF in 19 properties (sum of four Palo Alto groups in the 10-K)B U.S. SEC EDGAR
Simon Property Group Ground lease from Stanford to 2064; acquired 2003 (2025 10-K).	REIT	1,322,323 sq ft (Stanford Shopping Center, 94.4%)A U.S. SEC EDGAR
Hudson Pacific Properties 2025 10-K office table: Palo Alto Square 318,180 sq ft (98.4% leased), 3400 Hillview 207,857 (100%), Page Mill Hill 182,562 (75.5%), Page Mill Center 172,666 (100%), Clocktower Square 100,655 (100%); the sum is ours. Palo Alto Square also has 12,740 sq ft in repositioning.	REIT	981,920 sq ft in 5 office properties (sum of the 10-K rows)A U.S. SEC EDGAR
Kilroy Realty 2025 10-K: 1701 Page Mill Rd (128,688 sq ft, 100% leased) and 3150 Porter Dr (36,886 sq ft), both held on a ground lease with contractual expiration December 2067; the 10-K table does not name the lessor.	REIT	165,574 sq ft in 2 buildingsA U.S. SEC EDGAR
Google Inc. ACFR principal-taxpayer table (FY2016: $158.2M, No. 3). The table does not list the parcels. Google is also among the ten largest electricity customers.	Public company	$385.5M taxable assessed value (No. 2 taxpayer, FY2025)A City of Palo Alto, Administrative Services Department
Other top-ten taxpayers (single-asset LLCs) FY2025 taxable assessed values, ACFR (source California Municipal Statistics). The ten largest taxpayers together hold $8.92B, 18.1% of the city's taxable value. The sponsors behind these LLCs were not established from an opened record.	Private company	395 Page Mill LLC $132.0M; Park Village Peninsula LLC $130.7M; Palo Alto Tech Center LLC $121.3M; KRE El Camino Real Owner LLC $109.9M; SI 45 LLC $89.9M; M10 Dev LLC $89.8MA City of Palo Alto, Administrative Services Department

Looked for and not found

Claims this page would have made if a source could be opened. They are left out rather than guessed.

Who stands behind the single-asset LLCs on the top-ten taxpayer list (395 Page Mill LLC, Park Village Peninsula LLC, Palo Alto Tech Center LLC, KRE El Camino Real Owner LLC, SI 45 LLC, M10 Dev LLC) and which parcels each holds. The ACFR names the taxpayers but not parcels; the Assessor's site refused our requests.
Whether Stanford is the ground lessor for Kilroy's 1701 Page Mill Rd and 3150 Porter Dr (ground lease to December 2067) and for Alexandria's and Hudson Pacific's Research Park buildings. Both sites lie in Stanford Research Park, but the 10-K tables do not name the lessor.
Title holders of Stanford Hospital (500 Pasteur Dr), the VA Palo Alto Health Care System campus and HP's headquarters (1501 Page Mill Rd); no opened record states them.
Builder lot holdings, single-family-rental holders and Palo Alto Unified School District parcel counts and acreage, which need the Assessor's roll.
The Recorder's per-document copy fee (titleSearchFee), because clerkrecorder.santaclaracounty.gov refused our requests.

Sources

Top 10 Taxpayers in Santa Clara County, FY 2022-23 (assessed value and ad valorem taxes): Google, PG&E, Campus Holdings, Apple, Planetary Ventures LLC, Cisco, Westfield Malls, Applied Materials, Intel, LinkedIn — County of Santa Clara, Department of Tax and Collections (data.sccgov.org) · openA
City of Palo Alto Annual Comprehensive Financial Report, fiscal year ended June 30, 2025 (Principal Property Taxpayers; Assessed Valuation and Parcels by Land Use; Principal Employers; Capital Asset Statistics; notes 7, 8, 10) — City of Palo Alto, Administrative Services Department · openA
Stanford Research Park — Wikipedia · openA
Simon Property Group, Inc. Form 10-K for 2025, Item 2 Properties (Stanford Shopping Center) and Schedule III — U.S. SEC EDGAR · openA
Stanford Shopping Center — Wikipedia · openA
Palo Alto Airport — Wikipedia · openA
Stanford Health Care — Wikipedia · openA
VA Palo Alto Health Care System — Wikipedia · openA
Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Inc. Form 10-K for 2025, Item 2 Properties (Greater Stanford submarket) — U.S. SEC EDGAR · openA
HP Inc. Form 10-K for fiscal 2025, Item 2 Properties — U.S. SEC EDGAR · openA
Hudson Pacific Properties, Inc. Form 10-K for 2025, Item 2 Properties (office portfolio table) — U.S. SEC EDGAR · openA
Kilroy Realty Corporation Form 10-K for 2025, Item 2 Properties and ground-lease table — U.S. SEC EDGAR · openA
Building Permits Survey, places in the West Region, annual 2025 (we2025a.txt) — U.S. Census Bureau · openA