3 ms·

The rents are astounding to me as an Atlanta area resident. My fully loaded mortgage+escrow payment on an entire 3 BR house with a full basement (in which I hav

by rietta 10y ago

The rents are astounding to me as an Atlanta area resident. My fully loaded mortgage+escrow payment on an entire 3 BR house with a full basement (in which I have an office and wired for Cat6 ethernet) is less than $1100/month. There are tons of tech companies within commuting distance and even more remote work opportunities as a developer. Chances are good that we'll finally have gigabit fiber to the home within a year and current Comcast service is serviceable at 75 MBps.

techsupporter 10y ago
> The rents are astounding to me as an Atlanta area resident. My fully loaded mortgage+escrow payment... I see this a lot of the time when rents for certain areas of the country come up. My friends in Dallas and Austin say the same thing. FWIW, I own a duplex unit inside the city of Seattle, so my views may also be a little skewed. My usual response is, "yes, but then I'd have to live in [other city]." There are a lot of advantages to living where I do, in my opinion; that's why I chose to live there. The weather is a not-insignificant consideration. I don't ever have to look at a weather forecast and see that the expected high is 100F-or-above for the next month. Natural beauty is another. Local culture is yet another. One other point about the cost of housing: you wrote "Atlanta area," so I imagine you're OTP. By comparison, I'm paying $1,600/month to own my 2BR house inside Seattle, and I don't begrudge any cent of it. Mortgages inside Atlanta proper are possibly in the same range. So it's not a question of being astounding or out of the ordinary, just different life choices. > Chances are good that we'll finally have gigabit fiber to the home ...and I have gigabit fiber, too. ;)
- rietta 10y ago
  I'm in Alpharetta, which is a tech center in its own right by some standards. Housing prices jump $300k across the street from my neighborhood. So yes, prices can go really, really high around these parts.
  - techsupporter 10y ago
    As an aside, I was going to guess either Marietta or Alpharetta but didn't want to assume, so thanks for fulfilling my mental side bet. :)
    - rietta 10y ago
      You're welcome.
- rietta 10y ago
  And yes, it is about weighing the pros and the cons. I personally have chosen very much to refuse any engagement/job that requires daily commute into an office. I understand that is a privilege that comes with being a developer and not something everyone can do.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - cinquemb 10y ago
    I was in the same position, but decided to just move Jakarta to live in a fully furnished 2bd apt (along with other other amenities of the building) for about $750/month (I paid this much for a room in a 3bd apt in Boston, with nothing sort of the amenities). Different pros and cons (see remote working cross timezones). I think in the long run as more and more work allow for it, it will free up pressure in extremely nominally inflated areas that I consider most top US cities to be, but I see this more as a long term trend since there's a lot of entrenched interests to treat real-estate more like a financial instrument.
    - mooreds 10y ago
      And remote work needs to get more and more mainstream. If that doesn't happen, then the pressure will remain on the geographies with many job opportunities, and most of the wealth will flow to the landowners.
      - cinquemb 10y ago
        There are some economic incentives for companies to push towards more remote working: less capital expenditures of offices (which might matter more for smaller companies), possibly some downward pressure on wages (depending on the industry/skills), but I'm not too optimistic about it.
- alexchantavy 10y ago
  > ...and I have gigabit fiber, too. ;) What's your provider?
  - techsupporter 10y ago
    CenturyLink.
  - rietta 10y ago
    With Google Fiber out of the race, it's pretty much a question of when AT&T will run their Gigapower service here. They're installing for the neighborhoods less than a mile away at the moment. I suspect Comcast will get more competitive with their gigabit service in short order to compete or AT&T will upgrade their service here.

by rietta 10y ago

techsupporter 10y ago

> The rents are astounding to me as an Atlanta area resident. My fully loaded mortgage+escrow payment... I see this a lot of the time when rents for certain areas of the country come up. My friends in Dallas and Austin say the same thing. FWIW, I own a duplex unit inside the city of Seattle, so my views may also be a little skewed. My usual response is, "yes, but then I'd have to live in [other city]." There are a lot of advantages to living where I do, in my opinion; that's why I chose to live there. The weather is a not-insignificant consideration. I don't ever have to look at a weather forecast and see that the expected high is 100F-or-above for the next month. Natural beauty is another. Local culture is yet another. One other point about the cost of housing: you wrote "Atlanta area," so I imagine you're OTP. By comparison, I'm paying $1,600/month to own my 2BR house inside Seattle, and I don't begrudge any cent of it. Mortgages inside Atlanta proper are possibly in the same range. So it's not a question of being astounding or out of the ordinary, just different life choices. > Chances are good that we'll finally have gigabit fiber to the home ...and I have gigabit fiber, too. ;)

rietta 10y ago
I'm in Alpharetta, which is a tech center in its own right by some standards. Housing prices jump $300k across the street from my neighborhood. So yes, prices can go really, really high around these parts.
- techsupporter 10y ago
  As an aside, I was going to guess either Marietta or Alpharetta but didn't want to assume, so thanks for fulfilling my mental side bet. :)
  - rietta 10y ago
    You're welcome.
rietta 10y ago
And yes, it is about weighing the pros and the cons. I personally have chosen very much to refuse any engagement/job that requires daily commute into an office. I understand that is a privilege that comes with being a developer and not something everyone can do.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- cinquemb 10y ago
  I was in the same position, but decided to just move Jakarta to live in a fully furnished 2bd apt (along with other other amenities of the building) for about $750/month (I paid this much for a room in a 3bd apt in Boston, with nothing sort of the amenities). Different pros and cons (see remote working cross timezones). I think in the long run as more and more work allow for it, it will free up pressure in extremely nominally inflated areas that I consider most top US cities to be, but I see this more as a long term trend since there's a lot of entrenched interests to treat real-estate more like a financial instrument.
  - mooreds 10y ago
    And remote work needs to get more and more mainstream. If that doesn't happen, then the pressure will remain on the geographies with many job opportunities, and most of the wealth will flow to the landowners.
    - cinquemb 10y ago
      There are some economic incentives for companies to push towards more remote working: less capital expenditures of offices (which might matter more for smaller companies), possibly some downward pressure on wages (depending on the industry/skills), but I'm not too optimistic about it.
alexchantavy 10y ago
> ...and I have gigabit fiber, too. ;) What's your provider?
- techsupporter 10y ago
  CenturyLink.
- rietta 10y ago
  With Google Fiber out of the race, it's pretty much a question of when AT&T will run their Gigapower service here. They're installing for the neighborhoods less than a mile away at the moment. I suspect Comcast will get more competitive with their gigabit service in short order to compete or AT&T will upgrade their service here.