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That's a tough argument to make that SF beats SLC in net savings. You should try living with your family in a house with a backyard, it's quite enjoyable and c
by WhitneyLand 10y ago
That's a tough argument to make that SF beats SLC in net savings.
You should try living with your family in a house with a backyard, it's quite enjoyable and could be pretty cheap over time if you see any appreciation.
Secondly there are a lot more taxes on a lot more things in SF, are you factoring that in?
Also I'd bet you are worth more than 105k in SLC if you looked around longer.
I love SF and it's great to live there for many reasons, but I don't think "cheaper than utah" is one of them.
- jorblumesea 10y agoSame with Seattle. Houses going for 300-500k, Salaries 110k+, minimum. I really don't think it's true either for my region. If you love the startup world, hard to beat SF.
- nojvek 10y agoNot much left in Seattle under 500k. The market is pushing the prices even higher.
- jorblumesea 10y agoSouth Seattle, West Seattle and some parts of North Seattle are still fairly affordable, for an engineer at least.
- drstewart 10y ago>You should try living with your family in a house with a backyard, it's quite enjoyable and could be pretty cheap over time if you see any appreciation. You should try living in a cabin in the woods. Way cheaper plus you get fit from chopping up firewood for the winter. Obviously only a fool would live in a city in Utah when they could live in rural Alaska for cheaper!
- Zelmor 10y agoPlease leave. >>> 4chan is thataway
- DannyBee 10y ago"You should try living in a cabin in the woods." This isn't even close to a reasonable retort.
- akiselev 10y agoIt is if you have a preference for urban environments and your choice is between SF/NYC/London/etc and Salt Lake City, where it feels like every other street is as wide as the average block in another city. To each their own of course.
- ghaff 10y agoWell, in SLC you are about an hour drive away from arguably the best skiing on the planet. To each their own of course.:-)
- davidgay 10y agoTo be fair, SF is far closer to and more practical for good skiing than London or NYC. And yes, living in the Bay Area, I miss (from Switzerland) skiing being an hour's drive away. It's all relative...
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- WildUtah 10y agoOutside SF proper, the SV urban design is as bad as in Utah.
- akiselev 10y agoAppropriate username :) I spent most of my time in Eden and Ogden so I don't know anything about SLC's urban design beyond my impression of the sprawl from brief visits. Personally, I think terrible urban design is the norm in the US (in no small part to suburban sprawl) and SF/Bay Area are easily some of the worst offenders in my limited experience. I can't really think of any well designed cities in California because the vast majority are parts of huge metropolitan areas where everything is so spread out that you end up driving through five or more different towns each with their own geographies and philosophies on urban design just on your daily commute. I think I'm heavily biased though, because most of the old cities in Europe seem to me to be far better despite their chaotic growth over many centuries.
- WhitneyLand 10y agoWhy are you acting like I said Utah was better? I said there are many reasons to live in SF. The point is I don't agree with the conclusion a family can save more living in SF. As great as SF is for some people with a young family not having a house with a backyard is a big deal. Regarding your final incorrect assumption, yes I would love living in a cabin in the woods and chopping firewood.
- kcorbitt 10y agoWhile we'll probably end up in a house with a yard eventually, I don't feel a pressing need for that lifestyle at the moment. I am factoring in taxes and cost of living. The difference doesn't make up for the $55k wage gap. It's possible that I could have done better than $105k if I had looked harder, but based on how much my friends in that area make I doubt it. My salary in the Bay Area also has a lot more headroom to continue growing. The calculus worked out better for SF in my case because I'm saving most of my income either way. If I wanted a higher-consumption lifestyle (big house, two cars, lots of eating out etc.) then a lower-income lower-COL area might have been a better deal overall. But I'm at a stage where I don't mind "sacrificing" a bit for a better future. And honestly, it doesn't feel like a sacrifice anyway -- my wife and I are still living a lot better than we were until recently as university students, and enjoying every day. There's no reason why consumption has to scale with income!
- deathanatos 10y ago> While we'll probably end up in a house with a yard eventually How, might I ask? Assuming $1.5M for a townhouse or a house in the Bay Area, Google's mortgage calculator says ~7k monthly in payments. At $160k and 25% tax, you're left w/ 10k/mo; you'd be spending 70% of your income on housing, not counting maintenance. You'd need to make a significant downpayment (which even then, IDK if it helps, since I've seen housing easily range to more than $2M+, and I feel like I'm lowballing it (ha!) at $1.5M) or have your partner also pull a decent income, no? (I've never bought a house, so please, feel free to inform me, b/c from where I'm standing, it's incredibly daunting.)
- WildUtah 10y agoIt's rare to be worth a lot more than $105k in SLC; wages are pretty low and deep specific expertise isn't often bought so much as grown in house. Especially with a startup. If you're looking at $105k in SLC, you should be asking for $225k+ in SF by my experience. -- We did the calculation between $125k in SF and $45k in SLC a decade ago and SLC came out well ahead for a family of four.
- prh8 10y agoI think SLC salaries vary a lot by technology too. There's a lot of developers I know in that range here that would be around 135 in SF. Completely agreed on how much better of a value it is here though.