I've been through this a few times now, and for me it's definitely the money. San Francisco cost of living is out-fucking-rageous. Sure you can find cheaper hou

I've been through this a few times now, and for me it's definitely the money. San Francisco cost of living is out-fucking-rageous. Sure you can find cheaper housing outside of the city, but now you've got a long commute to deal with. Recent college grads are willing to deal with it because they don't know any better, because they think working in the valley is cool, and because they have the flexibility of being young and single. The problem is that recent grads don't have the experience most of you are looking for. The people with the experience are quite often married and have two careers to think about when making a move. If you're asking me to risk the move on my own, that's one thing. If you're asking me to beg my wife to halt all progress in her career, that's another. And now you're telling me that you're not willing to pay me enough to live relatively close to work and still have the same cash flow? No thanks! Edit: As an aside, a lot of startups try to justify the drop in cash flow with equity. Please... stop doing this. I don't mean to say that you shouldn't offer equity, you absolutely should. However I'm already telling you that I'm risk averse. Or, put differently, I'm telling you that I need compensation that's stable and easy to value. Your equity is nice, and I definitely want it, but it's the opposite of what I'm asking you for.