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SF is great (really, just stop it haters!) and there will always be people who want to live there and prices will always be relatively high. However, for a lon

SF is great (really, just stop it haters!) and there will always be people who want to live there and prices will always be relatively high. However, for a long time SF has been a place of extreme price distortion because of low (~no) new construction and huge concentration of high paying jobs. The result is many many people feeling trapped there way beyond where it makes sense for their lives. If you are single and living with roommates, making $200K at Twitter, then great! SF is awesome! But when you have two little kids, and/or you just aren't making that much, in a place where small houses are > $2M things are very different. That's me BTW. We hung on for 6 years after having kids and in that time almost all couples with kids we were friends with left. The people we knew who stayed were either much wealthier (had nice exit from previous company) or were really trapped and talked constantly about leaving. So honestly it does make sense to me. Somewhat anecdotally, I personally know about 15 people who have left since April (including me, SLC is freaking awesome!). For comparison, I personally know exactly 2 people who've had covid. So yeah lots of people really are leaving and the closed bars are just a small factor (IMO), being able to finally move is the much bigger change driving this migration. I don't think SF will die but rents and home prices coming back down to earth will be a very good thing for the city (my landlord bought the building in 1981 and was charging us $4K/mo for our 900sqft 2br flat, I won't feel bad for him if that deflates to $2500/mo where it should be). The ultra high prices have slowly gutted large parts of the city of anyone but the young or wealthy, mostly tech people. Maybe in a few years SF will be more affordable and consequently a much more diverse city again. That would be great IMO.

bumby 6y ago
I’m curious as someone who has never lived in SV (only visited for work) but do you feel like there are certain areas that displaced SV gravitate towards and would eventually cause property in those areas to rise as well?
- CalRobert 6y ago
  I haven't lived in the bay area in 9 years (used to live in Berkeley), but so far my old SFBA friends have moved overwhelmingly to Portland, with one going to Colorado, another to Seattle, and two staying. One is a wealthy engineer, and the other (who has a kid in Marin) an incredibly fortunate person who was curious about this bitcoin thing 10 years ago.. I don't know of any "regular" people who stayed in the bay, except for a relative who's stuck there because of shared custody over kids with an ex and can't practically move. She'd like to though.
- gizmo385 6y ago
  As someone who also has never lived in SV, I'd imagine that, if the majority of these people leaving are young, active, relatively wealthy individuals, that they would move to areas where they can advantage of that position. A lot of people in that demographic are probably relatively active and might have would want to move somewhere with access to lots of outdoor activities. My guesses would be: SLC, Denver, Phoenix. Disclaimer: I'm from the Denver metro so am obviously biased here. Also please don't move here because housing is expensive enough ;)
  - 205guy 6y ago
    Closest "outdoor place" to SFBA is Tahoe, and indeed it has been flooded with transplants, driving up prices everywhere, and displacing residents: https://www.sfgate.com/renotahoe/article/bay-area-transients-bring-housing-crisis-tahoe-15640932.php https://www.sfgate.com/renotahoe/article/bay-area-transients...
- UncleOxidant 6y ago
  As someone who lived in SV 30 years ago... I moved to Portland. And yes, property values here have risen quite a bit since then. And many moved to Seattle where prices have risen even more. Changing your question a bit: Given that prices here in Portland (and Seattle) are relatively high now (though not nearly so much as SV) what are some other lower cost alternatives on or near the west coast? Maybe Spokane. Possibly Olympia. Eugene? Though now we're getting into smaller urban areas.
- rcpt 6y ago
  Look at Bay Area price-to-rent ratios - some of the highest in the nation. California property prices are heavily driven by speculation. We have laws like Prop 13 that incentivize buyers to take out the biggest loans possible and put NIMBYs on steroids. If SV workers move to a state that welcomes newcomers instead of punishing them don't expect the same meteoric property increases.
- eagsalazar2 6y ago
  Tahoe, SLC, Portland, Austin, Minneapolis. It is only in part about moving somewhere awesome. A lot of people I know are just moving home to where their parents live. So lots of places. For us, a lot of our family actually is in SF or Seattle. We're a skiing/biking family and I need to be in SF pretty regularly (but not daily) so SLC was the obvious choice. Portland was a candidate because it also has short flights to SF but I figured if we were going to move I wanted world class skiing and biking, in my backdoor, not just decent skiing 1.5hrs away.

bumby 6y ago

I’m curious as someone who has never lived in SV (only visited for work) but do you feel like there are certain areas that displaced SV gravitate towards and would eventually cause property in those areas to rise as well?

CalRobert 6y ago
I haven't lived in the bay area in 9 years (used to live in Berkeley), but so far my old SFBA friends have moved overwhelmingly to Portland, with one going to Colorado, another to Seattle, and two staying. One is a wealthy engineer, and the other (who has a kid in Marin) an incredibly fortunate person who was curious about this bitcoin thing 10 years ago.. I don't know of any "regular" people who stayed in the bay, except for a relative who's stuck there because of shared custody over kids with an ex and can't practically move. She'd like to though.
gizmo385 6y ago
As someone who also has never lived in SV, I'd imagine that, if the majority of these people leaving are young, active, relatively wealthy individuals, that they would move to areas where they can advantage of that position. A lot of people in that demographic are probably relatively active and might have would want to move somewhere with access to lots of outdoor activities. My guesses would be: SLC, Denver, Phoenix. Disclaimer: I'm from the Denver metro so am obviously biased here. Also please don't move here because housing is expensive enough ;)
- 205guy 6y ago
  Closest "outdoor place" to SFBA is Tahoe, and indeed it has been flooded with transplants, driving up prices everywhere, and displacing residents: https://www.sfgate.com/renotahoe/article/bay-area-transients-bring-housing-crisis-tahoe-15640932.php https://www.sfgate.com/renotahoe/article/bay-area-transients...
UncleOxidant 6y ago
As someone who lived in SV 30 years ago... I moved to Portland. And yes, property values here have risen quite a bit since then. And many moved to Seattle where prices have risen even more. Changing your question a bit: Given that prices here in Portland (and Seattle) are relatively high now (though not nearly so much as SV) what are some other lower cost alternatives on or near the west coast? Maybe Spokane. Possibly Olympia. Eugene? Though now we're getting into smaller urban areas.
rcpt 6y ago
Look at Bay Area price-to-rent ratios - some of the highest in the nation. California property prices are heavily driven by speculation. We have laws like Prop 13 that incentivize buyers to take out the biggest loans possible and put NIMBYs on steroids. If SV workers move to a state that welcomes newcomers instead of punishing them don't expect the same meteoric property increases.
eagsalazar2 6y ago
Tahoe, SLC, Portland, Austin, Minneapolis. It is only in part about moving somewhere awesome. A lot of people I know are just moving home to where their parents live. So lots of places. For us, a lot of our family actually is in SF or Seattle. We're a skiing/biking family and I need to be in SF pretty regularly (but not daily) so SLC was the obvious choice. Portland was a candidate because it also has short flights to SF but I figured if we were going to move I wanted world class skiing and biking, in my backdoor, not just decent skiing 1.5hrs away.