7 ms·

Depends on what you mean by "outskirts of the Bay Area" and what is the school district. Say you have 2 kids under 5, you have to pay around 1200-1500$ for edu

Depends on what you mean by "outskirts of the Bay Area" and what is the school district. Say you have 2 kids under 5, you have to pay around 1200-1500$ for education for each of them, 3200-3800$ is rent. Doable? Not really [edit] Even if your kids are not in school yet, good school district means better neighborhoods (for most parts).

ryandrake 11y ago
I live about 50 miles from work (~2 hour commute each way) and my monthly housing cost is around $2000. It's totally do-able. 2 hours is a little on the high end for a commute, but it's not the end of the world.
- mox1 11y ago
  4 hours a day driving is not "a little on the high end", you are 4x the average american (~50 minutes round trip). Spending 4 hours to work 8 hours is crazy.... It amazes me anyone does this and has a normal life.
  - pc86 11y ago
    The longest commute I ever had was open highway, about 40 miles in each direction. Rush hour was not an issue as I was just going between two small towns. It was awful. Sure, I got to listen to ~90 minutes of podcasts or Audible each day, but even still that's not productive time. All it took was one accident on the highway and my day just went from 9.5 hours to 12. Needless to say, my next job (and current) is about 4 miles away from my house and my quality of life has gone up exponentially, even though when I was doing it I did not mind the commute much. You could double my salary and I don't think I would even consider a 2 hour one-way commute.
- Jtsummers 11y ago
  Is your commute driving yourself or public transport? Carpooling? If it's driving yourself, that's 4 hours a day, 5 days a week. 20 hours a week, say 48 work weeks a year (assuming vacation and holidays give you 4 weeks off), that's 960 hours, or 40 days of driving each year. Just to and from work. I agree that it's not the end of the world, but I resolved long ago to never have a commute like that (I came close at 1.5 hours each way for a month before I moved closer to work). That's a lot of time not being spent with family (if you have one) or that could be spent on other goals (personal, professional, educational).
- algorithmmonkey 11y ago
  So, get in your car at 7 am to get to work by 9 for your daily stand up. You then work your 9 - 10 hrs., because it's a good day and no major deadline looming. Then you get in your car at 6 pm (you skipped lunch or ate on the run) for your 2 hr drive. Instead of going home you go to the gym for a much needed workout, but sadly when you leave it's now 9:30 pm. Hopefully, you'll be able to grab some fast food b/c you have no time for a real meal. Finally, you get home at roughly 10:15. You are just in time to catch a show, set the alarm, climb into bed and get some zzz's before starting the grind tomorrow. And that glimpse is without a family...
- gabbo 11y ago
  2 hours each way sounds absolutely, life-alteringly, macro-level awful to me. It boggles my mind that someone would consider that "a little on the high end for a commute" - it might be a worthy tradeoff all things considered, and "totally do-able" in that one can do it...but personally (and I'd expect for many people), I wouldn't be happy if I was in a position where I had no choice but to be commuting for 4 hours. Yeah you can fill that time up with podcasts or audiobooks or that sort of thing, or work for a Bay Area tech company with a work shuttle and maybe-kinda-sorta-work along the way, but you're still giving up 2-3 hours of free/unconstrained time (one might make the argument "but I would be doing the same things at home anyway" but in my mind there's a huge difference between those two situations).
  - ljk 11y ago
    > but you're still giving up 2-3 hours of free/unconstrained time It'd actually be 4+ hours a day since it's 2-3 hours each way.. sounds crazy to me
    - gabbo 11y ago
      Oh I meant 2 hours each way (or 4 hours per day) is an extra 2-3 hours on top of what most would view as a typical North American commute (ballparking at 30-60 minutes each way, or 1-2 hours total per day). The absolute level of craziness of 4 hours commuting daily is pretty high, but the incremental craziness on top of your typical commute is really what I meant here. :)
    - mesozoic 11y ago
      Head off to work. Work 3 hours on bus in. Eat lunch have standup. Head off to home and work 3 hours. If you want an 8 hour day. My bet is that's frowned upon.
- avitzurel 11y ago
  I have 3 kids (6yr, 4yr 3mo). I can't imagine a scenario where I am just sitting in my car for 2 hours on the way to work and on the way back. Almost to the day 2 years ago I wrote this post http://avi.io/blog/2013/12/06/why-i-will-never-work-out-of-an-office-again/ http://avi.io/blog/2013/12/06/why-i-will-never-work-out-of-a... still super relevant today. I don't know your situation and if you have kids or not, but I will never be able to do what you do. ever.
  - ryandrake 11y ago
    Yea, I've got a 3 year old who gets plenty of daddy time at night and on the weekends. Can't say I _like_ the commute, but it's not as horrible as all these dramatic replies make it sound. I'd definitely move closer to work in a heartbeat if the South Bay or peninsula was affordable.
    - simoncion 11y ago
      > ...it's not as horrible as all these dramatic replies make it sound. I do sincerely hope that you're one of the few who can happily give up half of 5/7ths of his leisure time for his family. I've never personally known anyone -family man or no- who can endure such a lengthy daily commute for more than a few years. Something just wears away at you until -one day- you realize that you're deeply dissatisfied about something... and eventually come to realize that it's your long-ass commute.
  - gknoy 11y ago
    Totally off-topic, but what did you use to make the charts for your productivity-per-hour, and how did you track productivity? I use a time-tracking app (Toggl), but it's not easy to determine the difference between an hour when I'm on fire and an hour where mt brain feels like fuzz.
    - avitzurel 11y ago
      I use RescueTime. It's awesome!
- ectoplasm 11y ago
  Everyone is tearing you apart, but this is normal in Japan.
  - simoncion 11y ago
    According to this [0], the average one-way commute time in Japan is a bit over 50 minutes. So, no. A 120 minute one-way commute time is not normal in Japan. [0] http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/14/world-of-commuters/?_r=0 http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/14/world-of-commut...
    - ectoplasm 11y ago
      Yeah, ok, fair enough. First, I was conflating Tokyo with Japan. Second, by normal I meant "culturally accepted" so maybe I shoulda just said that. But you know, normal kinda also means "within 3 sigma" as well as "mean". These data for Tokyo are interesting: http://nbakki.hatenablog.com/entry/2014/02/20/124942 http://nbakki.hatenablog.com/entry/2014/02/20/124942 and this one for Japan paints a more vague but differently interesting picture: http://www.japan-guide.com/topic/0011.html http://www.japan-guide.com/topic/0011.html Really, it's not unusual to meet a salaryman with a 2-hour commute.
      - Apocryphon 11y ago
        I don't think we should be trying to emulate Japan in this respect. I don't think the Japanese themselves want this sort of life.
        ectoplasm 11y ago
        Yeah, me neither... but I don't think blaming commuters like ryandrake for advocating their lifestyle is the answer. Different people have different priorities. You wouldn't sneer at OP for working 60-hour weeks (it's glorified in the valley), but that's what a 40-hour work week with a 4-hour daily commute amounts to. I dunno, maintaining a separation between work and home can be healthy.
- serge2k 11y ago
  That sounds god awful. I consider quitting every time my drive home takes over 40 minutes.
josephjrobison 11y ago
Isn't the Richmond or Outer Richmond area fairly affordable?
- simoncion 11y ago
  The number I see bandied about for one-bedrooms in Richmond/Outer Richmond is between $2,400 to $2,600/month. [0] Given that you're goddamn not raising a family in a one bedroom [1], I'd say avitzurel's rent estimation sounds fairly reasonable, and definitely below average for the entire city. [2] [0] http://priceonomics.com/the-san-francisco-rent-explosion-part-iii/ http://priceonomics.com/the-san-francisco-rent-explosion-par... [1] Especially many of the tiny places that pass for "one bedroom" apartments in the city these days. [2] Of course, the trick is finding an apartment to house your clan.
- avitzurel 11y ago
  In general, the easy bay is cheaper than the south bay (MV, SJ, etc..). However, because Facebook is now a bridge away from the easy bay it drove prices up like crazy. For a 2 bedroom in a good school district, I doubt you can find anything under 3200, this will be a steal.

ryandrake 11y ago

I live about 50 miles from work (~2 hour commute each way) and my monthly housing cost is around $2000. It's totally do-able. 2 hours is a little on the high end for a commute, but it's not the end of the world.

mox1 11y ago
4 hours a day driving is not "a little on the high end", you are 4x the average american (~50 minutes round trip). Spending 4 hours to work 8 hours is crazy.... It amazes me anyone does this and has a normal life.
- pc86 11y ago
  The longest commute I ever had was open highway, about 40 miles in each direction. Rush hour was not an issue as I was just going between two small towns. It was awful. Sure, I got to listen to ~90 minutes of podcasts or Audible each day, but even still that's not productive time. All it took was one accident on the highway and my day just went from 9.5 hours to 12. Needless to say, my next job (and current) is about 4 miles away from my house and my quality of life has gone up exponentially, even though when I was doing it I did not mind the commute much. You could double my salary and I don't think I would even consider a 2 hour one-way commute.
Jtsummers 11y ago
Is your commute driving yourself or public transport? Carpooling? If it's driving yourself, that's 4 hours a day, 5 days a week. 20 hours a week, say 48 work weeks a year (assuming vacation and holidays give you 4 weeks off), that's 960 hours, or 40 days of driving each year. Just to and from work. I agree that it's not the end of the world, but I resolved long ago to never have a commute like that (I came close at 1.5 hours each way for a month before I moved closer to work). That's a lot of time not being spent with family (if you have one) or that could be spent on other goals (personal, professional, educational).
algorithmmonkey 11y ago
So, get in your car at 7 am to get to work by 9 for your daily stand up. You then work your 9 - 10 hrs., because it's a good day and no major deadline looming. Then you get in your car at 6 pm (you skipped lunch or ate on the run) for your 2 hr drive. Instead of going home you go to the gym for a much needed workout, but sadly when you leave it's now 9:30 pm. Hopefully, you'll be able to grab some fast food b/c you have no time for a real meal. Finally, you get home at roughly 10:15. You are just in time to catch a show, set the alarm, climb into bed and get some zzz's before starting the grind tomorrow. And that glimpse is without a family...
gabbo 11y ago
2 hours each way sounds absolutely, life-alteringly, macro-level awful to me. It boggles my mind that someone would consider that "a little on the high end for a commute" - it might be a worthy tradeoff all things considered, and "totally do-able" in that one can do it...but personally (and I'd expect for many people), I wouldn't be happy if I was in a position where I had no choice but to be commuting for 4 hours. Yeah you can fill that time up with podcasts or audiobooks or that sort of thing, or work for a Bay Area tech company with a work shuttle and maybe-kinda-sorta-work along the way, but you're still giving up 2-3 hours of free/unconstrained time (one might make the argument "but I would be doing the same things at home anyway" but in my mind there's a huge difference between those two situations).
- ljk 11y ago
  > but you're still giving up 2-3 hours of free/unconstrained time It'd actually be 4+ hours a day since it's 2-3 hours each way.. sounds crazy to me
  - gabbo 11y ago
    Oh I meant 2 hours each way (or 4 hours per day) is an extra 2-3 hours on top of what most would view as a typical North American commute (ballparking at 30-60 minutes each way, or 1-2 hours total per day). The absolute level of craziness of 4 hours commuting daily is pretty high, but the incremental craziness on top of your typical commute is really what I meant here. :)
  - mesozoic 11y ago
    Head off to work. Work 3 hours on bus in. Eat lunch have standup. Head off to home and work 3 hours. If you want an 8 hour day. My bet is that's frowned upon.
avitzurel 11y ago
I have 3 kids (6yr, 4yr 3mo). I can't imagine a scenario where I am just sitting in my car for 2 hours on the way to work and on the way back. Almost to the day 2 years ago I wrote this post http://avi.io/blog/2013/12/06/why-i-will-never-work-out-of-an-office-again/ http://avi.io/blog/2013/12/06/why-i-will-never-work-out-of-a... still super relevant today. I don't know your situation and if you have kids or not, but I will never be able to do what you do. ever.
- ryandrake 11y ago
  Yea, I've got a 3 year old who gets plenty of daddy time at night and on the weekends. Can't say I _like_ the commute, but it's not as horrible as all these dramatic replies make it sound. I'd definitely move closer to work in a heartbeat if the South Bay or peninsula was affordable.
  - simoncion 11y ago
    > ...it's not as horrible as all these dramatic replies make it sound. I do sincerely hope that you're one of the few who can happily give up half of 5/7ths of his leisure time for his family. I've never personally known anyone -family man or no- who can endure such a lengthy daily commute for more than a few years. Something just wears away at you until -one day- you realize that you're deeply dissatisfied about something... and eventually come to realize that it's your long-ass commute.
- gknoy 11y ago
  Totally off-topic, but what did you use to make the charts for your productivity-per-hour, and how did you track productivity? I use a time-tracking app (Toggl), but it's not easy to determine the difference between an hour when I'm on fire and an hour where mt brain feels like fuzz.
  - avitzurel 11y ago
    I use RescueTime. It's awesome!
ectoplasm 11y ago
Everyone is tearing you apart, but this is normal in Japan.
- simoncion 11y ago
  According to this [0], the average one-way commute time in Japan is a bit over 50 minutes. So, no. A 120 minute one-way commute time is not normal in Japan. [0] http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/14/world-of-commuters/?_r=0 http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/14/world-of-commut...
  - ectoplasm 11y ago
    Yeah, ok, fair enough. First, I was conflating Tokyo with Japan. Second, by normal I meant "culturally accepted" so maybe I shoulda just said that. But you know, normal kinda also means "within 3 sigma" as well as "mean". These data for Tokyo are interesting: http://nbakki.hatenablog.com/entry/2014/02/20/124942 http://nbakki.hatenablog.com/entry/2014/02/20/124942 and this one for Japan paints a more vague but differently interesting picture: http://www.japan-guide.com/topic/0011.html http://www.japan-guide.com/topic/0011.html Really, it's not unusual to meet a salaryman with a 2-hour commute.
    - Apocryphon 11y ago
      I don't think we should be trying to emulate Japan in this respect. I don't think the Japanese themselves want this sort of life.
      - ectoplasm 11y ago
        Yeah, me neither... but I don't think blaming commuters like ryandrake for advocating their lifestyle is the answer. Different people have different priorities. You wouldn't sneer at OP for working 60-hour weeks (it's glorified in the valley), but that's what a 40-hour work week with a 4-hour daily commute amounts to. I dunno, maintaining a separation between work and home can be healthy.
serge2k 11y ago
That sounds god awful. I consider quitting every time my drive home takes over 40 minutes.

josephjrobison 11y ago

Isn't the Richmond or Outer Richmond area fairly affordable?

simoncion 11y ago
The number I see bandied about for one-bedrooms in Richmond/Outer Richmond is between $2,400 to $2,600/month. [0] Given that you're goddamn not raising a family in a one bedroom [1], I'd say avitzurel's rent estimation sounds fairly reasonable, and definitely below average for the entire city. [2] [0] http://priceonomics.com/the-san-francisco-rent-explosion-part-iii/ http://priceonomics.com/the-san-francisco-rent-explosion-par... [1] Especially many of the tiny places that pass for "one bedroom" apartments in the city these days. [2] Of course, the trick is finding an apartment to house your clan.
avitzurel 11y ago
In general, the easy bay is cheaper than the south bay (MV, SJ, etc..). However, because Facebook is now a bridge away from the easy bay it drove prices up like crazy. For a 2 bedroom in a good school district, I doubt you can find anything under 3200, this will be a steal.