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What are all the people going to the bay area planning on doing long term? Was it never a long term place for most people? Just not thinking about it? Renting a

by tayo42 10y ago

What are all the people going to the bay area planning on doing long term? Was it never a long term place for most people? Just not thinking about it? Renting and living with roomates forever?

kylestlb 10y ago
Some of us have always lived here, and find it hard to move away from friends/family. I'm in that camp at the moment, but if I ever want to own a 'middle class' house, my partner and I will undoubtedly move (she teaches preschool and I'm a software engineer). Renting seems like the more 'sane' option because home loans are front-loaded with interest and non-equity payments anyways.
- kobeya 10y ago
  You could probably afford something in San Jose.
  - kylestlb 10y ago
    Depends on where - we basically live in SJ (Campbell) and the prices are still near 1M for a decent place. A friend just bought a >1M house in South SJ, far away from just about everything except Netflix. Midtown SJ is cheaper, and hopefully on the up-and-up. East SJ is cheap but sketchy. Downtown is getting nicer but is definitely on the more expensive side unless you want to live under a freeway.
closeparen 10y ago
Several of my coworkers are entering "long term" and having their first kids. Among this cohort, a 90-minute commute is luxuriously short. They walk at least a mile to their nearest BART stations (BART won't provide even close to adequate parking, or price it high enough to bring the waitlists under 3+ years), then stand elbow-to-elbow on the fully packed trains for 50+ minutes. They are the front lines, gentrifying the furthest places from San Francisco that are still part of its transit ecosystem. As they bid up property, their strategy will stop working soon, but by then they'll be owners. Extremely leveraged, house-poor owners, but owners. And they'll convince themselves that 3+ hours of dead time every day isn't a huge waste of life. I do something similar because my mental health goes down the toilet when I come home to the inescapable sound of other people's TV and phone conversations (and I already blast headphones all day at my open-plan office). The only people on my team with sub-30-minute commutes share apartments in the stabbier neighborhoods in the city. Oh, how I wish I could be content in a low-rise cube farm in the rust belt where I grew up. The scenery isn't pretty, but commuting on a freeway that actually moves is incredible. And the average door-to-door time is like 25 minutes.

by tayo42 10y ago

What are all the people going to the bay area planning on doing long term? Was it never a long term place for most people? Just not thinking about it? Renting and living with roomates forever?

kylestlb 10y ago

Some of us have always lived here, and find it hard to move away from friends/family. I'm in that camp at the moment, but if I ever want to own a 'middle class' house, my partner and I will undoubtedly move (she teaches preschool and I'm a software engineer). Renting seems like the more 'sane' option because home loans are front-loaded with interest and non-equity payments anyways.

kobeya 10y ago
You could probably afford something in San Jose.
- kylestlb 10y ago
  Depends on where - we basically live in SJ (Campbell) and the prices are still near 1M for a decent place. A friend just bought a >1M house in South SJ, far away from just about everything except Netflix. Midtown SJ is cheaper, and hopefully on the up-and-up. East SJ is cheap but sketchy. Downtown is getting nicer but is definitely on the more expensive side unless you want to live under a freeway.

closeparen 10y ago

Several of my coworkers are entering "long term" and having their first kids. Among this cohort, a 90-minute commute is luxuriously short. They walk at least a mile to their nearest BART stations (BART won't provide even close to adequate parking, or price it high enough to bring the waitlists under 3+ years), then stand elbow-to-elbow on the fully packed trains for 50+ minutes. They are the front lines, gentrifying the furthest places from San Francisco that are still part of its transit ecosystem. As they bid up property, their strategy will stop working soon, but by then they'll be owners. Extremely leveraged, house-poor owners, but owners. And they'll convince themselves that 3+ hours of dead time every day isn't a huge waste of life. I do something similar because my mental health goes down the toilet when I come home to the inescapable sound of other people's TV and phone conversations (and I already blast headphones all day at my open-plan office). The only people on my team with sub-30-minute commutes share apartments in the stabbier neighborhoods in the city. Oh, how I wish I could be content in a low-rise cube farm in the rust belt where I grew up. The scenery isn't pretty, but commuting on a freeway that actually moves is incredible. And the average door-to-door time is like 25 minutes.