Great and insightful article. Loved the line about getting larger pants to fix a weight problem.
Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons
21–30 of 187 posts
Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons
#22The more I read such articles, the more I think you'd have to be nuts to choose to live in San Francisco. And yet, clearly, plenty of people do choose to live in San Francisco.
It's a weird situation. There are so many tech companies out there and I'd like to work for some of them but I don't think the sacrifice I'll take with my standard of living will be worth it.
Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
> No need to turn this into another stereotyping Europe vs US issue But it is kind of true that Americans are extremely melodramatic about this stuff. 800 sqft house is often referred as a "tiny house" in American media. In the UK (for example) this is an average house size.
The US is over 10 times larger than the UK. Guess what, tons of land leads to different expectations. I don't understand why Europeans seem to like acting condescending about this stuff?
> The US is over 10 times larger than the UK. Guess what, tons of land leads to different expectations.
I'm not sure it's just that, it's also I think, that Americans find it acceptable to live in suburbs. If everyone tried to live in the city centers (like they do in nyc or SF), small places would also be the norm.
Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons
#24This isn't so bad. The Netherlands is the most dense population of any country outside Taiwan and families dwelling in small spaces continues to this day. There is a 12-member family spanning 3 generations all living in the same small house next door to me. Our tiny 60 square meter home is considered normal for our area. By American standards, SF seems like tight living, perhaps. But by world standards, space is not…
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and...
Netherlands is number 30. Admittedly most of the others are a lot smaller, but Bangladesh and South Korea are a lot bigger.
San Fran is also denser than the Netherlands, and AFAICS denser than any Dutch city (comparable with The Hague).
Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons
#25Growing up in communist Russia, 400sq. feet apartment would be the luxury option for 2 or 3 families with multiple children each. No joke, my parents lived with their siblings and parents (and sometimes grandparents) in the same apartment even after everyone had children of their own. Somehow we still managed to occasionally have 20 more people over for birthday celebrations and cook all the accompanying excessive am…
33sq.m. was the norm for two adults. When you had a kid, you submitted paperwork for extra 10-15 sq.m., but usually got moved to a new development, not in a desirable area.
My parents went through it in 80s. By then this mostly worked for military/otherwise connected families, but has broken down for the rest of the country with wait list numbering in years. In theory you gave up smaller apartment for a slightly larger as need arose. In practice, most families did not want to move far and construction pace did not keep up for economic reasons.
Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons
#26Growing up in communist Russia, 400sq. feet apartment would be the luxury option for 2 or 3 families with multiple children each. No joke, my parents lived with their siblings and parents (and sometimes grandparents) in the same apartment even after everyone had children of their own. Somehow we still managed to occasionally have 20 more people over for birthday celebrations and cook all the accompanying excessive am…
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Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons
#27The question is why do we have the most talented people in a certain industry having to live in confined spaces while paying through the roof for it. Not even Hollywood is like that. People may stay in trailers for some time but that's it As personally having to live in a tiny place (not in SF though) it is not something I want to do for an extended period of time, even though the advantages like 'city living' are go…
> The question is why do we have the most talented people in a certain industry having to live in confined spaces while paying through the roof for it.
Because it's their choice.
Right now the housing market in San Fran is redic. However, there are other major tech areas that don't nearly have the same problems.
Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons
#28Growing up in communist Russia, 400sq. feet apartment would be the luxury option for 2 or 3 families with multiple children each. No joke, my parents lived with their siblings and parents (and sometimes grandparents) in the same apartment even after everyone had children of their own. Somehow we still managed to occasionally have 20 more people over for birthday celebrations and cook all the accompanying excessive am…
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Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons
#29Growing up in communist Russia, 400sq. feet apartment would be the luxury option for 2 or 3 families with multiple children each. No joke, my parents lived with their siblings and parents (and sometimes grandparents) in the same apartment even after everyone had children of their own. Somehow we still managed to occasionally have 20 more people over for birthday celebrations and cook all the accompanying excessive am…
Striking, but hardly common.
You should clarify that in Russia they operate in "living space" sq.meters, meaning that 400 sqft will not include kitchen, corridors, bathroom, etc. Just the bedrooms and the living room.
Secondly, you are over-generalizing. While a part of population did in fact live in cramped conditions (or even in shared condos, whereby 2+ families shared a single apartment), more than enough people lived in a very decently spaced apartments, with living space ranging between 28 sqm to 40-50 sqm. So "400 sqft" apartments were nowhere close to being "luxury".
OTOH, a bathroom with a window - now that was indeed a true luxury (because how the vast majority of buildings where designed).
Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons
#30This isn't so bad. The Netherlands is the most dense population of any country outside Taiwan and families dwelling in small spaces continues to this day. There is a 12-member family spanning 3 generations all living in the same small house next door to me. Our tiny 60 square meter home is considered normal for our area. By American standards, SF seems like tight living, perhaps. But by world standards, space is not…
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and... Netherlands is number 30. Admittedly most of the others are a lot smaller, but Bangladesh and South Korea are a lot bigger. San Fran is also denser than the Netherlands, and AFAICS denser than any Dutch city (comparable with The Hague).
There are no other major countries from Europe on that list denser than Netherlands. Monaco is super dense, but consider that it's really really small.