Spanky
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
For demographics, crime, education, climate and economic data about a city, Sperling's Best Places is quite good.
Silicon Valley
- Thread starter Rich_by_the_Bay
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savedapile
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We lived in Mountain View/LosAltos for several years but our rent was paid by the company. We also lived in Southern California but I preferred No Cal more. Too much sprawl in the south. Horrible traffic in both places.
pros: Beautiful weather, loved San Francisco, the Redwoods, Mountains and Ocean. You could ski one day and go surfing the next. Great tolerance to diversity of race, sexual orientation, religion and gender. Outstanding ethnic restaurants everywhere. Biking, skating, hiking, windsurfing and a multitude of other sports and activities there. Got to see Elton John, Pearl Jam, Neil Young, Eric Clapton etc. right at the arena in Mountain View. Tremendous work opportunities for both of us.
cons: cost of housing and any service. Traffic. Schools had great difficulty keeping up with the many languages they had to deal with. Our neighbors would have lost their houses if they missed a couple of paychecks. We opted to not stay in the area due to the housing prices- we never would have reached FI there. I just could not stomach having to work forever just to afford housing.
pros: Beautiful weather, loved San Francisco, the Redwoods, Mountains and Ocean. You could ski one day and go surfing the next. Great tolerance to diversity of race, sexual orientation, religion and gender. Outstanding ethnic restaurants everywhere. Biking, skating, hiking, windsurfing and a multitude of other sports and activities there. Got to see Elton John, Pearl Jam, Neil Young, Eric Clapton etc. right at the arena in Mountain View. Tremendous work opportunities for both of us.
cons: cost of housing and any service. Traffic. Schools had great difficulty keeping up with the many languages they had to deal with. Our neighbors would have lost their houses if they missed a couple of paychecks. We opted to not stay in the area due to the housing prices- we never would have reached FI there. I just could not stomach having to work forever just to afford housing.
Spanky
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
savedapile said:
It seems the pros out-weight the cons.
Where do you live now? How is it in comparison to living in CA?
Brat
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
savedapile said:
Just about sums it up. The "cons" are about the same as NYC.
This is the Wall Street of the west as well as the area out of which comes much invention. There are some professions where proximity to the action is important, you must be on the field to play the game.
Housing is expensive because few of the towns have opted for high density housing. Services are expensive because service workers need a place to live too.
Languages: My DD lives in the Valley, grandson is 2.5 yo and speaks English and French (his playschool has used him as a toddler translator), attending a Spanish class. Because one of his sitters is Romanian, he understands that too. The community is a babble of languages.
Yes, it is a challenge for a student who doesn't know the language spoken by the teacher, as it is for a teacher who must communicate with students who speak a variety of non-English languages.
Spanky
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
This reminds me of graduate engineering schools.
savedapile
Recycles dryer sheets
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Spanky,
upstate NY close to Adirondack park. Live in a beautiful house worth about $250 (ould be several million in silicon valley) and paid for. Lots of yard for the dog. If you like to ski, hike and canoe, this is the place. Population density much less, traffic much less. We can afford to go to Europe or other big vacation yearly. Schools seemed to be very good when my kids went through. Not nearly as much diversity in the population.
The drawback here is the several hundred inches of snow you get. But then again much less likely to have an earthquake bother you.
upstate NY close to Adirondack park. Live in a beautiful house worth about $250 (ould be several million in silicon valley) and paid for. Lots of yard for the dog. If you like to ski, hike and canoe, this is the place. Population density much less, traffic much less. We can afford to go to Europe or other big vacation yearly. Schools seemed to be very good when my kids went through. Not nearly as much diversity in the population.
The drawback here is the several hundred inches of snow you get. But then again much less likely to have an earthquake bother you.
Spanky
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
Savedapile,
Upstate NY sounds pretty good as you described. I would like it there since I enjoy the outdoor and quietness. However, it probably does not sit well for DW. She likes the life of big cities and warm climate.
Spanky
Upstate NY sounds pretty good as you described. I would like it there since I enjoy the outdoor and quietness. However, it probably does not sit well for DW. She likes the life of big cities and warm climate.
Spanky
free4now
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The San Mateo/Redwood City area is coming alive. It's where I live. Downtown Redwood City recently had a huge makeover with a new square and theaters... whereas it used to be one of the sleepiest places in the area it's now starting to become a nightlife zone (at least by suburban standards). San Mateo has always had lots of good restaurants, ethnic and otherwise.
The best thing about living here is the access to outdoor activities... the ocean beaches of Half Moon Bay are a 20 minute drive away, and any town has lots of hiking trails within a few miles drive. Yesterday I went on an hour hike through the hills starting just a couple of blocks from my condo. The weather is quite good. Redwood City used to have the slogan "Climate best by government test" because some study long ago determined that it had one of the the best climates in the world. I don't need air conditioning, and the heater is only really necessary a few months out of the year.
But the craziness of this all is that most people out here don't get to enjoy much of these great outdoors. They're working long hours at tech companies to afford their 1-2 million dollar tract homes, and never really get to use much of these opportunities.
Silicon Valley can work somewhat well economically for single people because you get a big salary and can rent somewhat affordably. Costs for goods at big box stores or grocery stores are comparable to any other area or even cheaper sometimes. There are lots of opportunities to buy luxury high-markup items at boutiquish stores, but you can always pass those opportunities by.
The one thing that frustrates me about the area is that there's no cheap good men's haircuts. While working I had been paying $30something for a haircut at a boutiquish place because I trusted the hairdresser. When I FIRE'd about a year ago here I spent a lot of time trying to find a barber who could cut my hair for cheap, and they all charged almost $20 and gave schlocky haircuts. All the traditional barbers in the area seem to be very old and teetering on the edge of retirement. The one decent barber I found was out of business when I tried to come by for my second haircut with him. Of course there are "Supercuts" assembly-line places that will do it for $15 or so, but they often give me bad haircuts. Now that I've committed to moving out of the area to San Francisco, I decided I'm giving up the search and I'm going to just pay $30something for my next haircut at the boutique place I trust.
This is the nature of the area... there's effectively no middle class; there's the upper class of people who can afford million plus dollar homes, and the lower class of service workers that cram 15 people into a rental home to survive. The people in between those extremes have all left for Sacramento
Traffic is bad at rush hour... I too have had times when I've driven up to Berkeley on a weekly basis and that has been a nightmare. It's about 1.5 hours at rush hour whereas the return trip with no traffic is 45 minutes.
I've always lived close to work and highly recommend that, despite the price. In some sense you just have to suck it up and pay the high housing prices; there are no deals unless you're willing to drive more than an hour each way to work.
Renting is comparatively a much better deal out here than most places... you can usually rent for less than half the PITI payment on an equivalent place.
Crime is very low almost everywhere here on the midpeninsula (except East Palo Alto and even they are improving). This is another benefit to living out here... not worrying about burglar alarms, burglar bars, and neighborhood watches. Yes cars get broken into overnight, but you never hear about violent crimes or see shady characters on the street.
The best thing about living here is the access to outdoor activities... the ocean beaches of Half Moon Bay are a 20 minute drive away, and any town has lots of hiking trails within a few miles drive. Yesterday I went on an hour hike through the hills starting just a couple of blocks from my condo. The weather is quite good. Redwood City used to have the slogan "Climate best by government test" because some study long ago determined that it had one of the the best climates in the world. I don't need air conditioning, and the heater is only really necessary a few months out of the year.
But the craziness of this all is that most people out here don't get to enjoy much of these great outdoors. They're working long hours at tech companies to afford their 1-2 million dollar tract homes, and never really get to use much of these opportunities.
Silicon Valley can work somewhat well economically for single people because you get a big salary and can rent somewhat affordably. Costs for goods at big box stores or grocery stores are comparable to any other area or even cheaper sometimes. There are lots of opportunities to buy luxury high-markup items at boutiquish stores, but you can always pass those opportunities by.
The one thing that frustrates me about the area is that there's no cheap good men's haircuts. While working I had been paying $30something for a haircut at a boutiquish place because I trusted the hairdresser. When I FIRE'd about a year ago here I spent a lot of time trying to find a barber who could cut my hair for cheap, and they all charged almost $20 and gave schlocky haircuts. All the traditional barbers in the area seem to be very old and teetering on the edge of retirement. The one decent barber I found was out of business when I tried to come by for my second haircut with him. Of course there are "Supercuts" assembly-line places that will do it for $15 or so, but they often give me bad haircuts. Now that I've committed to moving out of the area to San Francisco, I decided I'm giving up the search and I'm going to just pay $30something for my next haircut at the boutique place I trust.
This is the nature of the area... there's effectively no middle class; there's the upper class of people who can afford million plus dollar homes, and the lower class of service workers that cram 15 people into a rental home to survive. The people in between those extremes have all left for Sacramento
Traffic is bad at rush hour... I too have had times when I've driven up to Berkeley on a weekly basis and that has been a nightmare. It's about 1.5 hours at rush hour whereas the return trip with no traffic is 45 minutes.
I've always lived close to work and highly recommend that, despite the price. In some sense you just have to suck it up and pay the high housing prices; there are no deals unless you're willing to drive more than an hour each way to work.
Renting is comparatively a much better deal out here than most places... you can usually rent for less than half the PITI payment on an equivalent place.
Crime is very low almost everywhere here on the midpeninsula (except East Palo Alto and even they are improving). This is another benefit to living out here... not worrying about burglar alarms, burglar bars, and neighborhood watches. Yes cars get broken into overnight, but you never hear about violent crimes or see shady characters on the street.
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