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In Bay Area, six-figure salaries are “low income”

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Re: In Bay Area, six-figure salaries are “low income”

#221

Post by Dunan »

mdorazio wrote: post #174
nommm-nommm wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much does that have to do with our increasing desire for more space though? The square footage of living space per person in a new home has increased from 506.6 to 980.7 since 1973. https://www.aei.org/publication/todays-new-homes-are-1000-sq...

I've seen this argument before and it's not a clear-cut relationship to desire at all. Did home buyers absolutely demand more and more space, or did developers realize they could make more by building bigger and bigger homes? Now we are in a situation where many, many young people looking to move to cities would be perfectly happy with smaller living spaces at associated smaller costs, but those properties straight u…

"many, many young people looking to move to cities would be perfectly happy with smaller living spaces at associated smaller costs, but those properties straight up don't exist, and also aren't being built"

This is it right here. Many municipalities won't even allow them to be built. I would love to live in a small town but such towns are designed around car ownership, total separation of residential and commercial districts, and massive housing lots. If you can't drive, you're stuck living in the big city. And that's only getting more difficult if you're middle income.

Re: In Bay Area, six-figure salaries are “low income”

#222

Post by kcorbitt »

geggam wrote: post #21

Single income, Alameda county ( Fremont ), family of 4 No car payment, No credit card debt, 130k will let you live and eat with a bit of room to go do things once a month. If you have a car payment and or credit cards kiss that once a month thing goodbye 150k will let you have a car and do things Source : I left that area recently

As a counterpoint, my family of 3 is living in San Bruno (San Mateo county, on the peninsula) on a budget of $50k[1], and enjoying life immensely. We do without a lot of things that other people probably take for granted, but it's by choice, not necessity. And even within that limited budget we can afford some great perks that most of humanity can only dream about, like a reliable car for getting around town and the two trips we took to Europe last year. I don't blame anyone for making different choices -- our lifestyle probably isn't a good fit for many people -- but I do think it's important that everyone realize that life doesn't have to be as expensive as what the median consumer spends in the developed world. Once you know that, you can make a deliberate choice about how much each additional luxury is actually worth to you, taking into account the opportunity cost of spending a dollar now vs having it available later.

[1]: This number is not related to my take-home pay, the balance of which is automatically invested and ideally forgotten until retirement. One of the great mysteries of human nature is that the average individual living a perfectly happy life on a salary of X will, upon finding himself earning 1.5X, naturally increase his expenditures to 1.5X as well, and yet find himself no happier than he was when his spending was just X. Don't be the average individual!

Re: In Bay Area, six-figure salaries are “low income”

#223

Post by kmonsen »

phkahler wrote: post #212
baddox wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds great, but one of the common rebuttals is that the job market (remote or otherwise) may be more challenging outside of the Bay Area.

>> That sounds great, but one of the common rebuttals is that the job market (remote or otherwise) may be more challenging outside of the Bay Area. It amazes me how many people in tech can't do simple math. Hint: The Detroit area job market is on fire, but you will pass it over if your idea of compensation doesn't take into account cost of living. I'm sure there are several other cities that can say the same.

I'm not an expert, but from my experience this is not true. If you do well in Bay Area (lets say ~500k total comp) it will be hard to match that in another area even including cost of living.

Re: In Bay Area, six-figure salaries are “low income”

#224

Post by chaostheory »

ransom1538 wrote: post #46
archeantus wrote: post #6

Wow, this resonates with me. In 2013 my wife and I were living in the Bay Area and had just welcomed our third child into the family. I was making 105k/yr at Apple (which seemed like a ton at the time!) but I felt like I was saving very little of that. I was approached on LinkedIn to take a job with matching pay but that was fully remote. I could live anywhere I wanted in the entire country. I jumped at the chance an…

Did the exact same thing this year. Moved to Oviedo, FL from SF: 1) no state income tax, 2) public schools in my neighborhood are equivalent to a private school in sf [i] 4) weather is great 8 months out of year, 5) beaches you can swim in, 6) rent is ~1/4 of what it was in SF, 7) cuban food, 8) as a resident, kids have year round disney passes [i] http://school-ratings.com/Florida/schools/Carillon_Elementar... WARNI…

Grew up in FL.

Weather is actually terrible about 8 months of the year. It's too humid and hot. The climate is perfect for mosquitos, forcing you to wear long sleeve clothing at night during this humid weather (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encephalitis). Insects and arachnids thrive in FL's swampy climate. People who aren't from either that or a jungle need to take time to adjust. Imagine being sweaty after walking outside for a few feet. AC is a must and you will pay around $200-300/month (maybe more) for electricity without an EV (on the bright side your house is 2-3 times larger than the Bay Area). Great place for solar. When I think about it, FL is probably the Australia of the US; there are a lot of things there that will kill you. (Almost every Floridian knows not to let their children play near water when it gets dark. The ones that don't end up on the news.) The good part is that it's easy to grow avocado and mango trees. Also unlike earthquakes, hurricanes are easier to forecast.

Other than water and the beaches, there's nothing to do compared to the SF Bay Area. Yes you can swim and surf in the beaches but due to decades of pollution, 'sea lice' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_louse) has been prevalent since I was a kid. Also due to erosion, most beach sand is now crushed rock. That said, the water is way nicer than anywhere in the SF Bay Area. If you like diving or snorkeling, you can hunt for lobsters yourself. Unfortunately, due to damage to the eco system, sharks are also a lot more aggressive, and they've been known to attack surfers as well for years now. Still, in some parts the water is so clear that you can see fish below while on a boat.

Florida is primarily a giant retirement community for northerners, making it mostly a nice giant boring, suburb unless you are attending a party college in the far north. Miami has a club scene but it gets old. It's not NYC or LA. Cuban food is amazing though and even if it is available in another state; it's not the same.

Forgot to add that there's less diversity in FL compared to other metros, even if you just compare it to other metros in the South it's still less. Maybe things have changed since I left?

Re: In Bay Area, six-figure salaries are “low income”

#225

Post by RDeckard »

mr_tristan wrote: post #187

And this is why tech jobs are going to continue to lead the charge to being mostly remote workers. Major tech hubs are crazy expensive, and the jobs are pretty amenable to remote work. At some point, there's going to be another inflection point where a lot of people making comfortable upper middle-class incomes move out to, well, anywhere. Basically, someone's going to do the math, and recognize that remote workers a…

Good foresight.

Re: In Bay Area, six-figure salaries are “low income”

#226

Post by xxpor »

tastythrowaway wrote: post #53
anon374939 wrote: post #19

After two years in San Francisco, I had to move back to my small(er) home town city because I ultimately realized there's little to no future for me in a city like San Francisco, despite making 250k/yr. I'd have to make at minimum $1M per year for a similar lifestyle (and even then, the stress of living in the bay area will reduce years from your lifespan... what's each year of your life worth to you?).

what were you doing/where were you working that you were pulling in 250k?

Is 250k considered unusual in the bay area for a BigCo for someone for someone 3-5 years out of college? If that's the case, choosing to living in SF is even crazier than I thought.

Re: In Bay Area, six-figure salaries are “low income”

#227

Post by phkahler »

geebee wrote: post #176
nosequel wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did the exact same thing 10 years ago. Couldn't take living in California any more. We moved to Colorado. * My health, both physical and mental has increased tremendously. * Our house is far cheaper in mortgage than our apartment was. * Schools are far better than anything in California we could afford * Crime is almost non-existent. Most people don't lock car or house doors. * It is rare I drive more than 8 miles on…

Can I ask you about one thing, though? Both my kids are in SFUSD schools, and San Francisco actually has a large number of 10/10 rated schools. This is based on test scores, of course, so it doesn't tell the whole story. For instance, take a look at this: http://www.greatschools.org/california/san-francisco/schools... Do you think that your elementary school in Colorado are vastly better than the top three we see her…

>> San Francisco actually has a large number of 10/10 rated schools.

Is that on a national or state scale? I find my district in Michigan making all kinds of claims like that about many of our schools, but it's all compared to others in the state. Nationally we're still above average but nothing to get excited about.

Re: In Bay Area, six-figure salaries are “low income”

#229

Post by coltalk »

kevinburke wrote: post #184
coltalk wrote: post #179

I hear this sort of thing a lot and I have trouble reconciling it with my experiences. I live in SF and my total expenses (rent, food, entertainment, etc.) were ~$15,000 in 2016. I don't feel like I live a life of great deprivation. I get that the article is talking about a family of four, but even if we assume there are no economies of scale, my costs would work out to $60,000 for a family of four. I also get that I…

Among other things, childcare is wildly expensive. Throw in life insurance, and you want your kids to live in a good school district, right?

Hm, early childhood care is more expensive than I thought. I think the schools for my address do happen to be good.

Re: In Bay Area, six-figure salaries are “low income”

#230

Post by ig1 »

FireBeyond wrote: post #200
ig1 wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming a 60k deposit (so 340k mortage), you could get a 2 year fixed mortgage at 1.53% so your repayments will be £1,178.31. £70k post-tax is around £48k so £4k/month so the mortgage will take around 30% of your take-home pay which is a fairly standard ratio.

Where are you renting near London (so you can work that same job) that you can both pay that AND save 60K? Considering that looking at similar 3 bedrooms to those suggested for purchase gives rates of around £1350 / month. Even putting aside another 1/3 of your income (high) still leaves you looking at 5+ years to save a deposit.

£70k = 48k post-tax

60k/(48k*1/3) = 3.75 years

And that's assuming you start from zero savings.

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