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A CEO Who Pays Employees to De-Locate from the Bay
- phamilton 9y agoAnyone who owns a home in the bay area is going to pay 5-6% in fees to sell their home. $10k isn't going to cover that loss. The ultimate perk (which is often provided by big corporations in a relocation) is to cover the real estate fees.
- adamdill 9y agoWhat percentage of developers own a home in the bay area? Its probably low enough to not matter in this case.
- phamilton 9y agoSenior Engineers? Developers over the age of 30? People with kids? Plenty own property. This comes across as another form of Zuckerberg-esque ageism.
- gvd 9y agoI never understood a real-estate fee of 6-7%. Real estate agent is what you become if you don't like work and have no other way to be productive to society in my opinion.
- sabujp 9y ago"was if you're in the Bay Area and you take a job with Zapier we'll pay $10,000 to help you relocate to anywhere, or as we call it, de-locate." ..so this is just a one time re-location "bonus"? I think many large companies "pay you" something close to this amount to re-locate to the bay area. This really doesn't help that much. What would be better is to pay bay area salaries/rates in another part of the country that doesn't have stupid expensive housing rates + 10k/yearly for not working in the bay area.
- mwfunk 9y agoMany/most companies pay something like this for relocation. I never thought of it as a bonus, rather a way for an employer to offset the expense and misery of moving. If a company didn't help pay for relocation, I wouldn't want to work for that company. It's not a bonus, it's an expectation.
- 31reasons 9y agoFacebook pays $50k to relocate to Bay Area!
- aaron-lebo 9y agoBut then you have to work at Facebook.
- Spivak 9y agoSay what you want about the business side, but everyone I've talked to from Facebook on the engineering side loves it.
- aaron-lebo 9y agoDon't get me wrong, it would be a lot of fun to work with world class engineers, it's probably a blast, but life is too short to work for unethical organizations run by egomaniacs.
- astrange 9y agoEveryone I talk to there is practically contemplating suicide (their words) before their RSUs vest. Trying to add some process just doesn't go over well, apparently!
- slantedview 9y agoBut then you have to live in the bay area.
- watty 9y agoThis seems pretty genius. There is a surplus of highly skilled engineers in the Bay Area who are getting mediocre pay (when cost of living is taken into consideration). This allows Zapier to attract more of these highly skilled workers and not pay a premium to those in the bay area.
- CiPHPerCoder 9y agoI don't know if it's genius. To those of us who have never lived in the Bay Area and are perpetually sticker shocked by housing costs, it's really, really obvious. But it's definitely a good idea.
- sidlls 9y agoWhen compared to cost of living, sure. But factor in savings rate and opportunities and the cost of living cut is well worth it. For example, I pay 2.5x in rent for a smaller place compared to what I was paying for a mortgage before I moved here. But my salary is 2x and a bit, and I'm saving more than 2x as a result.
- smelterdemon 9y agoIf you don't mind me asking, what did the 25% increase in housing/income ratio come out of if your savings rate stayed the same?
- btilly 9y agoPresumably the fact that food, entertainment, transportation and other expenses went up under 2x. For most Americans, housing+savings is under 50% of income.
- sidlls 9y agoThe only expense that went up appreciably was housing. Basic expenses for everything else averages out to be about the same. Internet and commute costs are about the same, food is slightly more expensive, and utilities (power, water) slightly less than where we were. I kept my 401k rate the same and effectively doubled the amount of money I'm saving. It's not my only savings, but it is the bulk of it.
- rm_-rf_slash 9y ago$10,000 is a strong relocation package but the fine print is pretty clear that it's for reimbursement - not as a signing bonus. You'd have to pay me pretty well to even consider moving to the Bay Area with today's housing prices. But if I'm already there with the salary I want, it may take even more to get me to leave. Certainly more than $10k in moving reimbursement.
- mattnewton 9y agoAgreed, the fact that I can drive to virtually any of the worlds largest tech companies and many of its promising startups from my current work is worth a lot more than 10k. Once that pressure is removed, I assume employers will pay market rate at wherever you relocated to.
- andy_ppp 9y agoI really enjoyed the podcast! It was probably the most impressive CEO I’ve heard, love the idea that he tslks to CEO a year or two away from where he is and picks their brains!
- stevecalifornia 9y agoMove to Washington State. Don't pay California income tax. Instant 8% boost to your take-home pay.
- cosinetau 9y agoThat, and Washington kicks hella ass. Washington State. Not that Washington. The good one.(tm)
- Jesus_Jones 9y agoNo, don't tell anyone. There are no jobs in Seattle, it's all a lie from Amazon, microsoft, facebook, hulu, google, tableau, memsql, and 1000 other startups.
- btilly 9y agoAnd hope that the REALLY big quake doesn't get you. You know, the one off your coast that is estimated at 100x anything that the San Andreas fault can produce. See https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/08/a-major-earthquake-in-the-pacific-northwest-just-got-more-likely/495407/ https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/08/a-major-... if you don't know what I'm talking about.
- cosinetau 9y agoYeah dude. No one can talk about the PNW or California without spreading a little gloom and doom! Nerds love gloom and doom!
- dgfgfdagasdfgfa 9y agoDenver is even better—competitive wages w/ washington & lower cost of living.
- dsfyu404ed 9y agoThere's a fire-hose of Californians directed at CO. In a decade or two they will have recreated the place they left.
- s73ver_ 9y agoOk, so I "delocate". Do I then have to take a pay cut because I'm now somewhere else? Spreading the tech sector out around the country even more is great, and things like this can be a step in the right direction. But a big part of why the Bay Area is what it is has to do with funding. Most VCs are there, and don't seem to be willing to move away. Hell, YC requires you to be there, at least during your time with them. And the concentration of tech talent means that it's always easy to find a new job, or even to start your own company.
- alexbanks 9y ago> And the concentration of tech talent means that it's always easy to find a new job, or even to start your own company. I've never been there, but I see this echoed a lot. Is it actually true? I'm interested in both, but I'm wary of the exaggeration that may be "it's easy".
- ntolia 9y agoHonestly, the answer will really vary depending on who you talk to. That said, if you have worked hard and built a network in the area, those things are actually true. Even around 2001/2002 as well as 2008/2009 there were always jobs around if you knew where to go look. Similarly, if one has established a reputation for themselves (one doesn't need to be a public figure though), it makes it easier to get something off the ground.
- alexbanks 9y agoHm. This seems hugely beneficial.
- jamesmishra 9y agoStarting a company is always unbelievably difficult, but the Bay Area's density makes things a little easier. I used to live in an apartment on 55 9th St, San Francisco. The guy in the apartment across the hall also started a company at the same time as me. He introduced me to other founder friends in the apartment building. The lobby has a coffee shop where I've made other founder, angel, and VC friends. And I haven't even started enumerating all my other startup-y friends I made outside of my own apartment lobby. I got very lucky, and your own mileage may vary, but if you're looking for helpful startup-y people, the Bay Area is still the world capital.
- zitterbewegung 9y agoSo by giving them a $10k carrot they can basically lock them in to the company because it would be much more difficult to interview for competitors or even start startups. That's pretty genius.
- briandear 9y agoExactly. Because startups are only allowed to interview on site in an approved conference room within a 10 mile radius of Sunnyvale. I also heard a rumor that getting funding for a startup requires a product with some traction. It isn’t like Sand Hill Road is lined with VC ATMs. Read The San Francisco Fallacy by Jonathan Siegel if you think success with a startup has anything to do with a Silicon Valley proximity.
- tehlike 9y agoThe reason is probably super inflated salaries in bay area due to high cost of living. Lock in has probably less to do with this than pure money aspect.
- tmh79 9y agothe salaries are not due to cost of living, they are due to a competetive labor market.
- tehlike 9y agoPositive feedback loop.
- logfromblammo 9y agoHigh cost of living because competitive labor market. Competitive labor market because high cost of living. You could break the vicious circle from either end. Build more houses, costs go down, more immigrants attracted, wages go down and costs go back up. Destroy local jobs, wages go down, fewer immigrants attracted, costs go down and wages go back up. Every tech company that moves out eases the pressure, but that part about wages going down is tough for some people to swallow.
- tmh79 9y agoI guess "start up pays delocation bonus that is less than 1/3 of a signing bonus at the big valley companies" is not as complelling.
- jpao79 9y agoHe (and Sam Altman for all YC companies) should have the startup(s) all de-locate to the same town that's within driving distance of the Silicon Valley. I bet you could convince a lot of tech people to move to Santa Cruz or Monterey. You could also recruit from UC Santa Cruz and Cal Poly. Both downtown Santa Cruz and downtown Monterey feel pretty small town urban-y. Plus the Silicon Valley VC's can play golf at Pebble Beach or Half Moon Bay Ritz Carlton and make a weekend getaway out of it AND get a business trip tax write-off for mileage and hotel says. And maybe before descending on the town you can get the city council and a developer to agree to build high density housing in the downtown core. This Palo Alto planning commissioner/Palantir spokesperson for high density housing in Palo Alto ended up moving to Santa Cruz: http://www.mercurynews.com/2016/08/10/palo-alto-planning-commissioner-quits-over-high-housing-cost/ http://www.mercurynews.com/2016/08/10/palo-alto-planning-com...
- throwaway2048 9y agoThat would fix things for a few years at best, and then it would likely end up even more expensive than the bay area.
- jpao79 9y agoWithin Monterey/Santa Cruz proper that is true, but there is quite a bit of farmland in Salinas for single family homes. Water might be an issue. Going north, you could head toward Rohnert Park/Sonoma. SamA and PG will just need to get in the car a bit more instead of taking Caltrain/BART.
- myrandomcomment 9y agoI lived in Menlo Park for 8 years with my family. When I moved there the startup I went to work for was a 5 minute walk from my house. My current startup is also in Menlo. A year ago my wife and wanted a larger place. We looked in Menlo and PA. $3M for a teardown / needs tons of work. After thinking about it we started to look outside of the area. School district was a key factor of course. We ending up going as far up the mountain from Los Gatos as we could and still be in the school district. $1.3M+500K remodel. Half of my companies employees are remote. We use G-apps with Meeting and Slack. It works well. I drive into the office 2 days a week timing the drive to be outside of traffic hows. 50KM drive outside of traffic is 30 minutes, with traffic is 1.5 hours. I have friends that moved to Morgan Hill, Gilroy and take the CalTrain in. We other developers relocate out of state because of the cost of living. The cost of housing in the main areas is stupid, even if you can afford it. Menlo and PA are doing NOTHING to support the high density housing required to make things better. I agree there is something unique about being able to have everyone around you in the same line of business (tech) and it is great for making contacts, etc. However the cost are really starting to outweigh the benefits. The bay area needs to look to places like Tokyo as an example of how to build out from the trains to the housing.
- Adrock 9y ago"...this remote thing helps me get away from San Francisco because I'm either disenfranchised with, you know housing costs here..." It's fascinating to see which words tech CEOs don't know the meaning of.
- darpa_escapee 9y agoIt's almost ironic.
- salimmadjd 9y agoInteresting podcast. I didn't know about Zapier so I checked out their website. It took me like 5-10 minutes to understand what they do. It was only after seeing the Gmail(attachment) > DropBox > Slack I understood what they really do. Which is very cool. I have one need. I want a quick way of converting a list of stuff on slack into todo list with ability to check off the task as they're completed. OR if I can have a keyword --TODO-- --END-- in gmail and turn it into a todo list. Will Zapier allow something like this?
- mdbennett 9y agoZapier Support here. The most common way I see people do this is by starring Slack messages they want to add as Todos. Here's a template that uses Todoist, although there's no shortage of alternatives on that side of things: https://zapier.com/app/editor/template/1580 https://zapier.com/app/editor/template/1580 Outside of that, you can build a zap that triggers on any message and use a Filter step to make sure only messages that meet your criteria(e.g. your keyword) move on to the action: https://zapier.com/help/how-get-started-filters-zapier/ https://zapier.com/help/how-get-started-filters-zapier/ If your ultimate goal is to manage the todo list from inside Slack, there's not a great way to do that with Zapier. Personally, I manually add/delete items in my 'You' channel to get to that type of functionality.
- 5706906c06c 9y agoOnce you leave the Bay Area, it becomes exponentially more difficult to come back, so the what-if scenario of this employment expiring becomes a real threat to financial viability.
- r00fus 9y agoNot if you keep your house (assuming you own) and rent it. Many lucky folks can rent for significantly more than cost/PITI, adding another passive income stream. So the pitch is: 1) De-locate to a more reasonable real-estate market where you can actually buy the house you want/need. 2) Rent-out your existing SFBay property if you own, and get additional income (even minus property management cut) 3) Get a bonus 4) Maybe move closer to family outside of SFBay. What's not said: 1) Career mobility is limited to whatever market you move to and within Zapier. 2) Salary probably likely won't make same leaps as if you stayed 3) You might have family in the SFBay - could be a downside to move away If you're career-stable and open to move it can be a good deal.
- trynewideas 9y agoLeave! The word you're looking for is "leave"!
- chrissnell 9y agoAs someone who works remotely and who posts remote-friendly openings for his team in the Who's Hiring HN thread, it's kind of amazing to me that more people aren't actively looking to get out. I live and work in a small midwestern town because my wife's military job has us here. If I was single, however, I would make the most of my remoteness and try working from a variety of towns. Here's some places that I would try if I was a young remote worker: - A small Colorado/Utah/Montana ski town. Some place like Telluride, where I could ski/hike/bike in the mornings - A fun desert town with great recreation like Moab, UT...Prescott, AZ...Bend, OR... - A beach town in S. Florida during the winter - Costa Rica, Panama, Bay Islands of Honduras in the wintertime - Thailand - South coast of Texas in the Winter, Texas Hill Country in the fall It could be so much fun...
- kilroy123 9y agoI work remote and I've worked from a few of these places. Panama is ok. Costa Rica and the Bay Islands of Honduras both have HORRIBLE internet. Thailand is hell if you need to work the same time zone as people in the US. But I agree, it's great to travel and work.
- santoriv 9y agoI worked remotely in Vietnam for about a year. It was pretty great. Fun and super cheap. I wasn't in a big city so I could literally pay my monthly rent with one hour of work.
- sidlls 9y agoIf you paid Bay Area wages and offered something more than at-will style job security you'd probably see more people wanting to get out. For me I've yet to see a remote position that wasn't fraught with the same risk as any other company, or that pays anything like a reasonable salary.
- chrissnell 9y agoI can't speak for other companies but we make salary offers based on the candidate's experience and role, not their location. However, the job security is an interesting point. I suspect that Zapier gains huge leverage over it's relocated employees because they're now dependent on their Zapier job, another hard-to-find remote gig elsewhere, or funding their own move back to a tech hub. I don't know what Zapier's pay bands are like but I'll bet their employee churn is lower than industry average.
- btilly 9y agoThat is a horrible format. I don't want to listen. I want to scroll and read at my speed. The most that I can use is what, 15% of my screen? And partway through reading it, it decided to start playing anyways and jump back to the beginning. If someone (eg me) wants a transcript, make it easy to get the transcript!
- mychael 9y agoPros/Cons of living in the Bay Area for most tech workers: Pros - Proudly displaying "San Francisco" in your Twitter bio. - An abundance of career opportunities. Cons - Making six figures, but still living with roommates. - Commuting to work in awful public transportation. - Becoming desensitized to poverty and fecal matter on the streets. - Feeling unwelcome by locals. - Not being able to afford to live in a cool part of town. - For straight men: Unfavorable male/female ratios at bars & nightlife. - Monoculture.
- btian 9y agoMore Pros - Drive to work in your Tesla - Free gourmet food at work - A lot of Whole Foods Market to shop at - Being rich AF
- uiri 9y agoNone of the points you list are at all unique to the Bay Area. The person you are replying to is highlighting the high cost of living and tax burden in the Bay Area (relative to other parts of the US). It is disingenuous to respond by claiming that a pro of living in the Bay Area is "Being rich AF".
- btian 9y agoIf you can get the same salary in Montana then you should move there. Are you disputing that wages are higher in Bay Area than rest of the country?
- nostrademons 9y agoAlso in the pros category: - Great weather. 8 months out of the year, it's basically guaranteed that if you walk outside it'll be sunny & 70. - Good outdoor parks. - Openness to ideas. - Every kind of food imaginable. - Relatively bike-friendly (Peninsula; uncertain about SF itself). Additional cons: - Traffic. - Poor public transportation
- marzell 9y ago
- ltaaug8 9y agoIf you want to attract talent outside the Bay Area, pay better. Even with the insane cost of living, I still end up ahead financially when I've compared to other places.
- pascalxus 9y agoI'm guessing this offer is going to be extremely popular. The second you leave the bay area, it's like getting a million dollar signing bonus for a place to live. I'm a little surprised more workers aren't leaving SF and the bay area peninsula. Even if you take 50% pay cut, your still getting paid a lot more, relative to you cost of living. I'm guessing the reason is: us engineers have a hard time understanding and thinking about compensation in terms of living costs, hence only the absolute $ value of a salary is taken into account. Also, I think a lot of people don't want to move away from friends and family.
- Graziano_M 9y agoSo you're getting paid to relocate to somewhere farther away from the bay. Maybe your salary will go farther, but you're giving up the whole reason people move to the bay area in the first place: It's where the jobs are. The bay area is what it is because there's a feedback loop. People setup here because there are jobs. There are jobs here because there are people to fill them. By relocating away you're giving up your mobility to other bay area jobs. That might be great while you keep that job, but then you're at a disadvantage (again) when you decide to move again.