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Ask Hacker News: Cost of living in Silicon Valley

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Re: Ask Hacker News: Cost of living in Silicon Valley

#41

Post by jyu »

kirubakaran wrote: post #37
falsestprophet wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that is a great idea, but I suspect you can accomplish the same thing by moving to a Midwestern college town or the ghetto in your hometown. The expense of moving is only worthwhile if you intend to take a very long time to build your product. Most web applications should only take a few months, right? If you do go to India, consider Goa. I am told it is very beautiful, very European, and the Goans speak Engl…

I agree that the India plan will be inexpensive only if the projects take more than 2 months. Problem with Goa is that it is very expensive due to all the tourists. It is comparable to the west, I hear. Coimbatore has mild climate, a dozen engineering colleges, inexpensive housing, great public transport, great food etc.

general rule of thumb: any place in a foreign country where most speak English will be expensive.

Re: Ask Hacker News: Cost of living in Silicon Valley

#42

Post by bps4484 »

I haven't seen anyone mention taxes in the equation, and if you're from a state with low state income tax and sales tax, that can really add up. Granted sales take may be already in people estimates prices, but income tax is progressive and gets as high as 9.3% past 43k of income.

Re: Ask Hacker News: Cost of living in Silicon Valley

#43

Post by curi »

bps4484 wrote: post #42

I haven't seen anyone mention taxes in the equation, and if you're from a state with low state income tax and sales tax, that can really add up. Granted sales take may be already in people estimates prices, but income tax is progressive and gets as high as 9.3% past 43k of income.

Dodge sales tax by buying everything from Amazon.

Re: Ask Hacker News: Cost of living in Silicon Valley

#44

Post by jdavid »

menloparkbum wrote: post #28
jdavid wrote: post #16

So we have been doing some exploring after another investor in the midwest told us to just move to the valley for the networking alone. he may be right. after a few visits, i can say that living in SF, and playing in SF is just fine without a car. SF will be expensive like living in the loop in Chicago, or in some parts of Manhattan, heck thats what you pay for being in the center of it. If you are coming from the su…

The problem with dating in the bay area is there is a 10:1 male to female ratio. The women are smiling at you because your fly is open.

lol, i don't think that was the reason, because the gay men would have been smiling too.

Re: Ask Hacker News: Cost of living in Silicon Valley

#45

Post by tim2 »

kirubakaran wrote: post #21

Please poke holes in this idea: 1. Save up some dollars 2. Move to a city in India that has good infrastructure (Coimbatore is the city I have in mind) =$1200 3. Release and iterate till you get good traction =$200/month/person 4. Move to Silicon Valley do the mating dance etc =$1200 Personal burn rate while at India would be as low as $200 per month without compromising on any comfort. After success, I plan to buy a…

I tried that last year for a little while in a very inexpensive part of Europe.

Holes:

1. Connections, funding, publicity. Kiss those opportunities goodbye.

2. Travel expenses will cost you, add another $2000(?) just for that.

3. I didn't speak the language at all... Makes it extremely hard to get a good deal on housing. Affects quality of life.

4. Places with very low costs of living and relatively high quality of life tend to attract lots of annoying foreigners. Locals then tend to dislike foreigners.

5. Moving can have big overhead. Basically all of the apartments were occupied in the city I moved to for the first 3 weeks. Pre-made plans fell through.

Re: Ask Hacker News: Cost of living in Silicon Valley

#46

Post by rms »

iamelgringo wrote: post #7

This is something that my wife and I thought a lot about before we moved out here, and we still work hard to keep costs very lean and mean. So, I'll write a book for ya. I've lived in Minneapolis, Chicago, LA, Providence, Fresno and now the Bay Area. And, it's the most expensive city we've lived in. There is usually a gentleman's competition ongoing as to what area is more expensive to live in: Bay Area or New York C…

Upvoted!

Re: Ask Hacker News: Cost of living in Silicon Valley

#47

Post by rms »

curi wrote: post #17
abstractbill wrote: post #5

My wife and I pay $1700/month for a two-bedroom house in Mountain View. I pay $300 each six months to insure an awesome Z3 that I never get to use (I take the train every day - $150/month for a pass between Mountain View and San Francisco). Internet is $60/month, Electric is usually about $50/month. I'm embarrassed to say I don't know how much we spend on food... I would guess about $400/month, but that could be wron…

Electric is significantly more if you keep multiple computers on 24/7.

It's worth it to me to pay the extra electricity to never have to turn my computers off...

Re: Ask Hacker News: Cost of living in Silicon Valley

#48

Post by rms »

kirubakaran wrote: post #23
sgoraya wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually a fantastic idea for the adventurous - The only thing I have issue with in the Indian sub-continent is the finicky electricity infrastructure - During my last few visits, the power went down randomly throughout the day, especially in the, very hot, summers; Granted some days are better than others, but if you can put up with it, the cost of living is a fraction of what it is here.

Such hassles can be easily abstracted away for, say, $25 a month I suppose (example: a bank of generators far away)

Hmm. Are you saying that electricity in India is sufficiently deregulated that there is competition for backup electricity suppliers?

Re: Ask Hacker News: Cost of living in Silicon Valley

#49

Post by kirubakaran »

rms wrote: post #48
kirubakaran wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such hassles can be easily abstracted away for, say, $25 a month I suppose (example: a bank of generators far away)

Hmm. Are you saying that electricity in India is sufficiently deregulated that there is competition for backup electricity suppliers?

No, I meant that it is inexpensive to set up your own backup. By 'far away', I didn't mean miles away... I meant far enough that you can't hear the noise.

Re: Ask Hacker News: Cost of living in Silicon Valley

#50

Post by ardit33 »

joeguilmette wrote: post #39

If you're lucky enough to work close to a BART stop, you're going to save yourself about $1000/month. Rent a room in a house close to any BART station. Berkeley is nice and cheap (it's all relative), as is the peninsula Redwood City and up, until you get to SF. The peninsula isn't actually connected to BART, it only runs south to Millbrae. You can, however, use Caltrain, which runs from san jose to sf, with BART conn…

excalty about the food part, and going to the dude going Olive Garden? WTF? I imagine it is ok to go to Olive Garden when you are in a place in middle america that has only chain restaurant around, but the bay area offers so much more in authentic multi-cultural cuisine, most of them family run.

Farmers market are awesome, and to get good deals go there late, around 2pm-ish, when the farmers are wraping their stuff, they'd rather give a lot of their food for half the price then bring it back.

If you live in SF, there is a awesome small grocery (only fruit and vegies) store at 4th and Geary. Very fresh, and very very cheap. Half the price you get in your local safeway/lucky's/calmart.

Ah, and stay away from wholefoods. Horribly overpriced.

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