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We moved to Utah where the tech scene is actually quite strong, and the cost of living is significantly less. We bought an 8k sq ft house for the price of many
by archeantus 9y ago
We moved to Utah where the tech scene is actually quite strong, and the cost of living is significantly less. We bought an 8k sq ft house for the price of many 1,500 sq ft town homes we had been putting offers in on in California.
It can be such a rat race down there, it is refreshing to remember that it doesn't have to be that way. Life exists outside of The Valley, and it happens to be a pretty darn good one (and affordable!) :)
- Sharlin 9y ago800 square meters????
- rocgf 9y agoMy reaction exactly. Americans use way too much, to be honest. 8k sq ft is more than enough for like 7+ families.
- CalRobert 9y agoYeah.. I mean, space is nice, but in homes of 800 or so square feet I've been pretty happy. How much carbon is emitted cooling and heating an 8k sq ft home in Utah? How far do you have to drive to do things?
- archeantus 9y agoOur utility bills certainly have gone up, which we aren't thrilled with. We are considering some solar panel options to help bring our carbon footprint down. Being fully remote, I try to make up for that by not driving very much :) Overall, the valley we live in has pretty much everything we could want, from a retail perspective. A nice small-town grocery store about 3 mins away, and larger national chains further down the road.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- _ao789 9y agoAfter living in 'cramped old london' for over a decade (still), I can only dream of the luxury of 800 Sq.m. Where do I sign up? :) fitting multiple people/families into anything less is just bad living standards as far as I'm concerned. You work hard all day long to go back to such a depressing existence. Time to start living fellow HN'ers!
- user5994461 9y agoOr time to charge more and get bigger
- scholia 9y agoWhich is why Londoners move to suburbia...
- _ao789 9y ago..and always dream of places like Spain (or better yet "Texas")
- leonroy 9y agoTime was Greater London was suburbia. Does that make Luton, St Albans etc. the 'suburbs' of London?
- scholia 9y agoSuburbia started at Aldgate, which is just outside the city walls ;-) A good rule of thumb is (or was): Does it have black cabs?
- CalRobert 9y agoEh, grass is greener. Some of us worked hard to live in lively, crowded European cities. The suburbs have their downsides. For me, it was crushing loneliness.
- scholia 9y agoYou live in the centre when you're young and single and changing jobs. You move to the suburbs when you have married, settled down and want kids, a garden, good local schools etc. When the kids have moved out, you can downsize to that retirement place in Spain... except that may not work as well after the UK leaves the EU.
- rsynnott 9y agoYeah, seems fairly ridiculous. You'd spend your life vacuuming.
- archeantus 9y agoThat was actually an onerous task at first. But I bought my wife a Neato robot vacuum a few years back and it has been such a nice thing to have.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- bonzini 9y agoProbably around 180 square meters plus 50 square meters garage, driveway and garden? Edit: duh, it's really 800 sqm.
- archeantus 9y agoYes, I guess 8,000 sq ft translates to 743 meters :)
- glup 9y agoI'm sure the OP purchased such a large house for efficiency... as their children mature they can just start their own families in various parts of the vast, cavernous manor.
- juliangoldsmith 9y ago8k sqft is ridiculous even by American standards. For a family of 5, I'd call about 2400 sqft (~220 sqm) normal, maybe a bit overkill.
- kelnos 9y agoThis is something I still don't get, even as an American. I live by myself in a 950 sq ft (~88 sq m) apartment, and that's already more space than I know what to do with. Sure, add a spouse and 2 or 3 kids and my space needs would increase, but I can't imagine needing 8-10x as much space, ever. Maybe 3x, at most 4x. I grew up in a fairly large house (I don't recall the size, but two floors, 6 bedrooms, kitchen, formal dining room, living room, family room, 3 bathrooms, basement filled with junk; so, fairly large -- semi-rural Maryland, where space was cheap in the 80s/90s). My parents weren't hoarders, though they did accumulate stuff. After my sister and I moved out and my mom passed away, my dad lived in a giant house by himself, couldn't maintain it, and also felt like he couldn't move because the house wasn't in good enough shape to sell. I just don't get this need for more and more space. It just encourages you to buy more stuff that you don't need, and takes more time/effort/money to maintain. I hesitate to "tell people how to live", but this keeping up with the Joneses attitude is a component of what causes cost of living to rise and is ultimately a zero-sum game.
- microcolonel 9y agoI know people who don't have the discipline to keep spaces open, but large open spaces can be wonderful (and easy to maintain). The tough thing is maintaining large arrays of intricate special-purpose rooms which you don't need and which are full of stuff that makes it feel small nonetheless. Space is wonderful for doing things like dancing, hosting guests, exercise, communal/family cooking (sprouting many kilograms of chickpeas, fermenting 40+qt of kimchi).
- archeantus 9y agoThere are certainly times I regret having so much space for our kids to clutter, but we ultimately bought it as a place for us to grow into. My wife is expecting our 6th child later this year, and our house has 6 bedrooms. So in that sense, it isn't insanely lavish, but a comfortable place to raise a large family. Also, as the commenter below mentioned, we do enjoy hosting people for parties and family get-togethers. We spend a good amount of energy and time and money on these activities that are for the enjoyment of other people. Wealthy people often build massive palaces to honor their own greatness and inflate their egos, I can assure you this is not one of those homes :).
- throwthisawayt 9y agoAre you a minority race and if so would you say that Utah is friendly to non-whites ?
- archeantus 9y agoI am not a minority race, but Utah is becoming quite diverse. My personal opinion is that it is a welcoming place and is a great place for families to raise their children.
- runako 9y agoUtah is a lovely place, but this stuck out to me > Utah is becoming quite diverse Was curious about this, as it didn't seem to fit my limited observation from my last few trips to Utah (which is again, a lovely place). The Census bureau government says Utah is >91% "white only": https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/table/PST045216/49 https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/table/PST045216/49 Which is likely more diverse than Utah was in the past, but could not be fairly compared to California as "quite diverse" given the same number for California is 73%: https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/table/PST045216/06,49 https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/table/PST045216/06,49
- archeantus 9y agoThat is a fair point. Instead of the word "quite", it might have been better to use the word "more".
- wmil 9y agoFederal numbers count hispanics as white. California was 42.3% non-hispanic white as of 2010, Utah was at 80% in 2013.
- dmode 9y agoJust FYI, all the Indian folks I knew moved out of Utah. Not sure if it is because of race or nom Christian religion
- parthdesai 9y agoWould love to move to Utah for couple of years one day, just because of skiing.
- herman5 9y agoDon't forget the mountain biking!
- base698 9y agoWhat's the power bill? I have considered doing the same but seems like you almost have to buy a house that big or live in a non-desirable area.
- mahyarm 9y agoAnother good thing about not living in the bay area is you dont have to pay pg&e rates for electricty. Us avg is 0.12/kwh while pge quickly gets up to +0.30/kwh
- archeantus 9y agoI'd have to look at the bill but I think that it averages out to be around $250-350/month for electricity.
- caseysoftware 9y agoBtw, I run https://twitter.com/SLCTechEvents https://twitter.com/SLCTechEvents which is a great way to plug in and see what's going on around Salt Lake City. Not sure if it will be helpful to you but I hope so. :)
- matwood 9y agoHopefully 8k sqft was a typo. I feel like 2500sqft is too much sometimes.
- fideloper 9y agoJesus, was hoping someone else caught that too. I have a 2300sq ft for a 4 bed two bath, wouldn't want much bigger at all!
- tropo 9y agoIt's Utah. You know, Mormons. The bit about them having huge families is real. With one kid or wife per bedroom and 1000sqft for kitchen/dining/whatever, you have room for 28. (4 wives, 6 kids each) Making the non-bedroom part of the house more luxurious and adding a bathroom to each bedroom, you have room for about 16. You can hit that even without polygamy. He may be counting a large garage. That could be 1000sqft by itself, so knock off 3 or 4 bedrooms.
- archeantus 9y agoMormons aren't polygamous. Please stop spreading this narrative that you know isn't true.
- tropo 9y agoOnly 95% of Mormons are in "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints". Fundamentalist Mormons are still Mormon, and yes, 10,000 to 30,000 of them are in plural marriages. Also, note that I didn't mean it as an insult, and I quite like large families. Even the mainstream Mormons tend to have large families.
- hyperbovine 9y agoI have to ask: 8000ft²? What are you doing with all that space? Are you Mormon?
- nrclark 9y agoI assume 8k is the lot size (~0.2 acre)? I had a similar experience moving to Colorado from CA.
- mightykan 9y agoI lived in Salt Lake City, Utah for 11 years. Needless to say, I got out five years ago the first chance I got. If you’re not into winter sports, the weather is shit. You get 10 months of bitter cold and snow every day. You have to dig your car out of the snow all winter and drive on horrible conditions with clueless drivers who seem to forget how to drive in snow every year. Spring and fall are one or so week each and you get rain storms the whole time. Then you have 6 or so weeks of scorching hot summer where it’s unbearable to be outside. I never ventured outside of the metro area and no one was ever overtly racist but boy if you are not a white Mormon you will stick out, you will be judged and questioned. Most Utah Mormons are conditioned to be nice so on the surface they appear so but they do judge and single out people who don’t belong. I visited SF over a weekend and was instantly surprised about how accepting everyone was. It just seemed like I fit in and belonged. I’d tolerate much worse conditions than “low income in SF” than be “rich” in Utah.