03/28/2024

As Oakland real estate empire crumbles, call center jobs to go with it

Another piece of Oakland entrepreneur Tom Henderson’s EB-5 empire appears to be crumbling.

An Alameda Superior Court judge has ordered the CallSocket call center housed in the historic Tribune Tower at 409 13th St. in downtown Oakland to shut down by the end of the month. As the Business Times reported yesterday, that building and two others have been put on the market by a court-appointed receiver.

The call center, billed as “the premier Silicon Valley call center” on its website, had several hundred employees.

Henderson, who heads the San Francisco Regional Center LLC, founded CallSocket as one of several Oakland ventures aimed at creating jobs funded by foreign investors. The regional center administers the federal government’s EB-5 program, which allows foreigners to earn U.S. residency by investing at least $500,000 in the United States and creating at least 10 permanent jobs.

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