Ask HN: Potentially Moving to SF / SV with a Family • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Potentially Moving to SF / SV with a Family

#41

Post by dmode » Tue, Aug 15, 2017, 8:49 PM UTC

pascalxus wrote: post #29

SV / SF is no place for a family. Most of it is high crime and quite seedy. You'll pay significantly more for housing. Only the 80% of SF which is rent controlled is affordable (as an outsider, you'll never get this). At market rate, For 6K/month you might be able to rent a tiny 2 bedroom apartment with no parking. You'll never be able to save up for a condo and you can forget about a house. Most of us, are trying to…

I have been living in SV for many years. There is very little crime, not sure what you are talking about. Even areas that were historically high crime (EPA and Oakland) are rapidly gentrifying that there will be no crime in the next 5 years.

Re: Ask HN: Potentially Moving to SF / SV with a Family

#42

Post by tannhauser23 » Tue, Aug 15, 2017, 8:50 PM UTC

apohn wrote: post #36

Since TripleByte also has companies in NYC, I'll provide a datapoint if you are considering NYC instead of the bay area. Our (my spouse and mine) goals around financial independence are similar to yours. We left the NYC area. Before I say anything else, one of the major benefits of both NYC and the Bay Area is that you have a lot of opportunites to climb the career ladder. If that's what you want, you'll have a lot o…

So did you end up leaving the NYC area? Where did you go, roughly speaking.

Re: Ask HN: Potentially Moving to SF / SV with a Family

#43

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 15, 2017, 8:51 PM UTC

jdavis703 wrote: post #40

toomuchtodo wrote: post #3

You will be accepting a decline in quality of life to move to SF for work (increase in salary is not congruent with your increased expenses), and must decide if its worth it. I'd suggest looking for full stack remote jobs where you'll make $100k-130k/year while remaining in Ohio (if thats where you want to live). Leaving a support system/family behind if you have a child (and considering another child) is not trivial…

I think this is a myth. I went from making $55,000 per year as a software engineer in Virgina to making over $100,000 per year in the Bay Area (I'm not anonymous on here so keeping exact amount secret). My rent went from $1500 per month to $2100 per month. My salary increase has more than covered the increased cost of rent.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Potentially Moving to SF / SV with a Family

#44

Post by dmode » Tue, Aug 15, 2017, 8:57 PM UTC

I am someone who lives with a wife and a kid in the Bay Area. I lived in single income for a year (was making around 150K as well). I had a small single family home in East Bay, which I bought at around 600K. Had a tough commute to the peninsula. It is doable, if you are ready to live in East Bay - Fremont, Union City, Dublin, Livermore etc. A job in the City proper is actually better as you can take the BART.

No one mentions the upside of living in the Bay Area: 1. My pay doubled as the stock market reached new highs in 3 years 2. My wife got a job in the 120K range 3. We sold our home and made 200K profit from it

In 3 years, we secured an extremely comfortable life, with money in the bank, great experience, in a booming job market, a large house and with all the amenities of living in the Bay Area.

If I am in your position, I would think where I would be in 3-5 years time.

Re: Ask HN: Potentially Moving to SF / SV with a Family

#45

Post by kingnothing » Tue, Aug 15, 2017, 8:59 PM UTC

You should be able to make $120k+ as a senior engineer in any of the top 5-10 markets. For example, look at Chicago if you'd like to stay near where you currently live and still have a reasonable cost of living.

There's no way I would stay in SF if I had children. Maybe south bay, but even then you're still looking at spending $4k / month on a 3 bedroom house.

Re: Ask HN: Potentially Moving to SF / SV with a Family

#46

Post by natch » Tue, Aug 15, 2017, 9:05 PM UTC

jdavis703 wrote: post #40

toomuchtodo wrote: post #3

You will be accepting a decline in quality of life to move to SF for work (increase in salary is not congruent with your increased expenses), and must decide if its worth it. I'd suggest looking for full stack remote jobs where you'll make $100k-130k/year while remaining in Ohio (if thats where you want to live). Leaving a support system/family behind if you have a child (and considering another child) is not trivial…

I think this is a myth. I went from making $55,000 per year as a software engineer in Virgina to making over $100,000 per year in the Bay Area (I'm not anonymous on here so keeping exact amount secret). My rent went from $1500 per month to $2100 per month. My salary increase has more than covered the increased cost of rent.

That works for a single person. Not so much for a family looking for a good school district.

Re: Ask HN: Potentially Moving to SF / SV with a Family

#47

Post by awaythrow101 » Tue, Aug 15, 2017, 9:10 PM UTC

coffee wrote: post #39

or.... You could consider living somewhere like Berkeley, which is a short (and direct) 20 minute BART ride into S.F. (if you don't have a remote or local job). I'd push hard to get your salary up to ~$165k/year as a senior-level (totally doable). After taxes and whatever you throw down for partial Health Care payments through your job, you can target around $9k/month in your pocket. 1) About 1/3 of your income can g…

To be clear, I'm completely fine with a commute. I thought that was obvious when I said suburbs. Hell, my current commute is ~35 minutes. How is it that Berkeley is apparently so cheap while being that close?

Re: Ask HN: Potentially Moving to SF / SV with a Family

#48

Post by jdavis703 » Tue, Aug 15, 2017, 9:15 PM UTC

natch wrote: post #46

jdavis703 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is a myth. I went from making $55,000 per year as a software engineer in Virgina to making over $100,000 per year in the Bay Area (I'm not anonymous on here so keeping exact amount secret). My rent went from $1500 per month to $2100 per month. My salary increase has more than covered the increased cost of rent.

That works for a single person. Not so much for a family looking for a good school district.

I didn't grow up in a "good school district." In fact, we were frequently at, or near the bottom in local rankings. However I think I've managed to do all right in life -- the experiences a child learns from outside of school, from libraries to good parenting, to just being allowed to roam -- are way more important than what you learn in the classroom.

Re: Ask HN: Potentially Moving to SF / SV with a Family

#49

Post by apohn » Tue, Aug 15, 2017, 9:18 PM UTC

tannhauser23 wrote: post #42

apohn wrote: post #36

Since TripleByte also has companies in NYC, I'll provide a datapoint if you are considering NYC instead of the bay area. Our (my spouse and mine) goals around financial independence are similar to yours. We left the NYC area. Before I say anything else, one of the major benefits of both NYC and the Bay Area is that you have a lot of opportunites to climb the career ladder. If that's what you want, you'll have a lot o…

So did you end up leaving the NYC area? Where did you go, roughly speaking.

I moved South, somewhere in the Carolinas/Georgia area.

Where I am now there are far fewer tech jobs than NYC, and a lot of the jobs are in companies that aren't as fancy sounding as what you'd see in NYC. I moved to a job with a bit of travel, so I didn't take too much of a pay cut. Some days I wonder if I made the right choice, but I don't worry about my savings getting destroyed by rent/mortgage+taxes during a job loss.

Re: Ask HN: Potentially Moving to SF / SV with a Family

#50

Post by pascalxus » Tue, Aug 15, 2017, 11:26 PM UTC

dmode wrote: post #41

pascalxus wrote: post #29

SV / SF is no place for a family. Most of it is high crime and quite seedy. You'll pay significantly more for housing. Only the 80% of SF which is rent controlled is affordable (as an outsider, you'll never get this). At market rate, For 6K/month you might be able to rent a tiny 2 bedroom apartment with no parking. You'll never be able to save up for a condo and you can forget about a house. Most of us, are trying to…

I have been living in SV for many years. There is very little crime, not sure what you are talking about. Even areas that were historically high crime (EPA and Oakland) are rapidly gentrifying that there will be no crime in the next 5 years.

Not SV, but SF is quite high in crime.