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I chose Facebook over Uber on 1/18/2019, which grossed me $92k.

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Re: I chose Facebook over Uber on 1/18/2019, which grossed me $92k.

#11

Post by huntermonk »

gnu8 wrote: post #10

I wonder how much he spends on housing.

From February until October 5th, I lived at [NEMA](https://www.rentnema.com/) downtown in SF. I was in a 450 sqft. apartment, and it was $3270/month. I absolutely hated it. NEMA was fine, but SF is not for me.

On October 5th, I just moved down to Menlo Park next to FB. I'm in a 3BR 1BA which is $1850/month. It's much better here.

Re: I chose Facebook over Uber on 1/18/2019, which grossed me $92k.

#17

Post by gnu8 »

huntermonk wrote: post #11
gnu8 wrote: post #10

I wonder how much he spends on housing.

From February until October 5th, I lived at [NEMA]( https://www.rentnema.com/ ) downtown in SF. I was in a 450 sqft. apartment, and it was $3270/month. I absolutely hated it. NEMA was fine, but SF is not for me. On October 5th, I just moved down to Menlo Park next to FB. I'm in a 3BR 1BA which is $1850/month. It's much better here.

Still not great. It hardly makes sense to pull $300k/yr just to pay it all out to a landlord.

Re: I chose Facebook over Uber on 1/18/2019, which grossed me $92k.

#19

Post by huntermonk »

trilinearnz wrote: post #18

Nice, thanks for sharing. It wasn't clear to me whether you cashed in your options. Is there still the chance you could lose that gain if the stock went down?

No problem! I appreciate your support.

I've sold my stock as soon as it's vested. I'm already overexposed to Facebook.

Re: I chose Facebook over Uber on 1/18/2019, which grossed me $92k.

#20

Post by windexh8er »

cityzen wrote: post #13

This feels like a weird, socially awkward humblebrag

The reality was it wasn't even a coin flip. They based things on pie in the sky estimates - treating them as factual evidence. If you're going to believe a recruiter on futures of stock options (not even RSUs) you're mad. Beyond that Facebook, at the time of consideration, was still a massive behemoth financially compared to Uber who had yet to publicly show an earnings report. I wrote this up right before Uber went public, but it was clear this stock was going to sink vs swim. They have nothing but debt, very little R&D that has long term viability any of the FAANGs couldn't just buy up as collateral, and have been throwing darts at how to monetize into the black since becoming commonplace. Had Uber had a few shreds of conservative approach to what they're doing I'd be far more behind them. But I was out at one of their research facilities on the east coast a couple of years ago and I couldn't believe the sheer amount of unknown and money (they didn't have) being dumped into autonomous at the time. Fast forward years and they still have no operational product. They're not Apple or Google with wads of cash to burn. The goal with going IPO was to accelerate the end product that makes them profitable, which they have yet to deliver.

Personally I don't think there was any choice that would have made sense other than Facebook to net you the most guaranteed cash. Cambridge was never going to sink FB, at least not in any timeframe that would have impacted your vesting schedule. You got in at the perfect time. Timing is everything, and the takeaway is make decisions on the known, not a recruiter floating numbers they don't remotely understand and are incented to make sound amazing.

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