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38, two kids and a wife. Have been living in a 900SQ/FT apt, I don't know how much longer I can take this before rage quitting and relocating somewhere else (do

38, two kids and a wife. Have been living in a 900SQ/FT apt, I don't know how much longer I can take this before rage quitting and relocating somewhere else (don't know where). The sad part, as a ethnic-minority, I have just found our community for my kids, etc. It would be really tragic if I have to tear my kids away from that. Don't get me wrong, my daily 30 minute commute on BART isn't the worst. The worst part is that I make $185,000-$238,000 (with bonus and all) and still can't afford to buy a home because I can't compete with other investors that have deep pockets filled with cash, not to mention buying a semi-decent home in a semi-OK neighborhood sets you easily back by $850K-$1.2MM. It's insane! The best I'm able to do is to pay for a $3550/mo rent and tuck away as much money as I can while providing for the wife and kids, which isn't the cheapest. Anyway, thanks for reading. Back to work. Edit: Armenian. Also, I'll check myself, there are others in far worse financial/living condition in the Bay Area. Comparatively speaking, I have it easier than most.

mabbo 9y ago
Get out, man. The region isn't trying to help people like you, with families, it's trying to help the entrenched who bought 20 years ago. You may make less money in terms of income in most other cities, but your retirement savings will grow a lot faster regardless. I work on a traveling/remote team. One of my teammates lives in Chattanooga. His 3 bedroom house with I think 2 or 3 aces of land put him back a whopping $200,000.
- nether 9y ago
  Lots of places like this. Check out this 3-bedroom with front porch, backyard, for $70,000 in Iowa: https://www.zillow.com/homes/for_sale/IA/pmf,pf_pt/87001013_zpid/19_rid/0-70000_price/0-254_mp/priced_sort/44.115197,-89.637452,39.719863,-97.141114_rect/6_zm/ https://www.zillow.com/homes/for_sale/IA/pmf,pf_pt/87001013_...
  - biesnecker 9y ago
    Ugh, look at the school ratings on that house, though. :-( Not that there aren't a lot of places in the country with good schools and affordable housing prices, but for a lot of people with kids schools matter as much or more than housing prices.
- btrautsc 9y ago
  Came to suggest this, cool that it already happened. Can confirm. Founder in Chattanooga. About 13 of our people live here / TN. Housing options (that appear) much better than in this thread with good public schools and sub-30 minute commute available. Specific ethnic communities may be harder to find. Pretty great housing from $250-600k all over the place
jraby3 9y ago
Wow that is a crazy rent. I also live with a wife and two kids in about a 1000 sq. ft. apartment and make a similar income (but pay $2k rent). I've been squirreling away $50k per year and buying cheap homes to help with passive income. Up to about $7k per month which helps a lot both in terms of future saving and investing and also with peace of mind if I ever lose my job.
- cat199 9y ago
  > squirreling away $50k per year If you can save that much, it's not really 'squirreling'..
  - cisanti 9y ago
    The whole SV area is out of touch with reality.
- breitling 9y ago
  Hey - what area do you invest in? Mind if I ask you a couple questions? please email me at trackoid at gmail dot com I'm also interested in REI, but not sure where the returns are in this market.
3pt14159 9y ago
What's the plan though? Like, tuck away the money to buy a place somewhere else? Or are you waiting for a housing correction?
- 5706906c06c 9y ago
  Option A, save to buy elsewhere. Option B, housing market correction, though unclear if that'll happen, so probably A. Option C, continue renting, save for kids college and retirement if I can't make it happen in the next 3-5 years, and realizing I'm being aggressively pessimistic.
srathi 9y ago
I'm in the exact same situation, minus the BART part. Not sure how long can I wait to buy a house. Also, If your commute is 30 min, then you are probably living around Fremont. Is the rent for 900sqft that high over there? This is touching SF territory.
- 5706906c06c 9y ago
  San Bruno, pretty much SF territory. My family owned and lived in Fremont, and my brother's commute often hovered around 60+ minutes on BART.
dmode 9y ago
I am curious where you are looking to buy. I bought 2 years back, 3000 sqft in Easy Bay close to a million. Have you looked at places like Hayward Hills, Union City, Dublin, San Ramon etc. ?
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- 5706906c06c 9y ago
  Yes, Castro Valley, Hayward Hills, etc. Selfishly speaking, the issue with moving further out means longer commute + plus distance from the kids school, etc. At that point, I might as well move out of state.
netule 9y ago
I'm in the same boat. Been here since 2012 and feel like I've wasted the good part of my twenties on this place. I'm desperate to get out of here but I'm having a hard time saving money and finding a place I'd want to to move to. I'm only half jokingly considering becoming an off the grid hermit.
Consultant32452 9y ago
>The sad part, as a ethnic-minority, I have just found our community for my kids, etc. Can you expand on what this means? Have you faced a lot of racism in SF?
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- 5706906c06c 9y ago
  Oh no, I look like a white guy, I'm Armenian, which is a tiny community with literally one little school off of Brotherhood way. I wasn't one to care about that, but I have to tell you, whenever I take my kids to the birthday parties or some PTA event, I sort of feel at home. It's odd because up until now, I didn't care about any of that, but I suppose my mortality is helping me prioritize on what matters in life. It's a mental and very much, an emotional struggle having to compromise.
DarronWyke 9y ago
As someone who's originally from California (not the Bay Area, though), let me tell you this: the cost of living, for what you get, is astronomically high compared to other places. Here in North Texas, I make around 100k/yr, and due to cost of living I can squirrel a lot of that away. We have no state income tax, and our property tax, while high, isn't nearly as high as California's (and will vary depending upon which county you live in -- massively expanding counties like Collin will charge more than rural ones like Johnson). With that income I was easily able to buy a ~1800sqft two story house in a good neighborhood. My total consistent expenses for each month are maybe 2/3s that of your rent, which includes non-consumables like mortgage, insurance, utilities, etc. In all of this, of course, I don't have kids and my wife doesn't (currently) work. If your spouse does work, then your spending power here becomes so much greater. Trust me. Get out. It's the best decision I've ever made and there's absolutely no fucking way I would ever live in CA again.
- _seemethere 9y ago
  Having lived in both Texas and now California I do have to say that the higher taxes do provide for better public everything. Texas seems so far behind when it comes to things like parks, transportation, and publicly available goods that coming to California is like a dream. I'd happily pay more taxes to be able to have these things be available for everyone.
  - DarronWyke 9y ago
    >parks, Been to a lot of very nice parks out here, nearly every city has one or more. Some of which are huge with large trails. >transportation, You might be confusing the Bay Area (or perhaps even LA) with all of California in general. I'm from San Diego originally. Public transportation there is a joke, plain and simple. BA and LA are both special in that regard. >and publicly available goods What is this?
- dmode 9y ago
  I have lived in Texas. It absolutely sucks in many ways. No real cities (yes, I have been to Austin, doesn't count). Nothing compared to California when it comes to recreation, vacations, day trips, road trips etc. Acceptance of LGBT lifestyles. Very church oriented (I am a non believer). Low salaries, tech opportunities in Dallas and Houston are not comparable to the Bay.
conanbatt 9y ago
That amount of money should suffice to mortgage a house if you can..people with less income buy houses in the area. However..remember that buying a house does not save you rent. You become an owner, so either you pay rent to the owner, or you stiff him, which happens to be you.
- 5706906c06c 9y ago
  Definitely aware of the trade offs, doing the means test indicates I should own, I digress. There is an emotional component, which is the kids. I grew up moving from one continent to another with no sense of security. I don't want the same for my kids, they deserve stability in their lives, and I've convinced myself that as a provider I need to make that happen for them.
  - MystK 9y ago
    Renting a place you don't own is definitely unstable.
groupthink-- 9y ago
take my word for it, do it for your kids and stay in california. figure out a way to make the money. just figure it out dude. rent forever if you have to, and don't tell anyone. do whatever it takes. being harassed and ridiculed endlessly for being non-white (i'm guessing asian or indian) somewhere inexpensive and 90% homogenous (white or hispanic or black) will produce extremely negative results, to put it mildly. dealing with racism on TV and in movies is one thing, dealing with it in real life is an entirely different proposition.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
jerf 9y ago
"The sad part, as a ethnic-minority, I have just found our community for my kids, etc. It would be really tragic if I have to tear my kids away from that." Contrary to apparently-popular belief (based on some other comments in this thread), the Bay Area is not the only place in the United States with ethnic-minority communities/enclaves, or the only region in the entire United States where "brown people" are not, apparently, shot on sight. Otherwise, how could there be articles about how "white" is on the verge of becoming a minority? (I won't deny that the Bay Area is very, very liberal, but you're really in a filter bubble if you think it's the only one, or even remotely close to describable that way.)
- groupthink-- 9y ago
  if by "brown people" you mean hispanic, that doesn't do much good for OP, who is most likely asian or indian. hispanic kids are even worse than white kids when it comes to making life hell for asian kids.
  - amyjess 9y ago
    Still plenty of places in the country where there are large Indian communities. There are a lot of Indians in Dallas; GP can come here. Or if GP doesn't want to live in a solid red state, there's always Millbourne, PA, which is over 40% Indian.
  - 5706906c06c 9y ago
    Armenian, actually, and that reduces the numbers to a very small population here, Fresno and L.A. Edit: there are other communities on the East Coast AFAIK, but I would be trading this for that.
    - junkcollector 9y ago
      Dallas specifically has a sizeable and vibrant Armenian community in the northern suburbs which also have very good schools and are affordable when compared to anywhere in Cali. North of Dallas is also a significant tech hub.
dragontamer 9y ago
> The sad part, as a ethnic-minority, I have just found our community for my kids, etc. California has a number of Asian communities, but depending on which culture you want... there are plenty of other cities out there. Filipinos are basically everywhere in the USA as far as I can tell... Vietnamese and Koreans are a bit more rare but still exist in virtually every major Metropolian area in the USA (New York, DC, Austin). A bit of exploration / tourism can go a long way. Visit other cities and look for a new home. Locals often can point you the way towards "Chinatowns" (even if they're mostly Vietnamese or whatever).
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
abritinthebay 9y ago
If you are paying that much in rent you can afford a mortgage on a larger place that’s a reasonable commute to the city. Now it'll likely be a condo, not a single-family home (that'll be more, or further way, or not as nice) but it's doable for sure. Not in SF, but just outside (Oakland, Fremont, Daly City, etc) What you can get will depend on what you can wrangle as a deposit but there are plenty of options if you can get 10% down. Source: it’s what I did recently and I pay less than that for a 1300sq ft place in Oakland
- 5706906c06c 9y ago
  I looked over 35th ave, which is fairly decent. Are there other pockets I should be looking at?
  - abritinthebay 9y ago
    It's amazing what comes up. A lot depends on your deposit. If you can swing a total cost of ~$750-850k home price then you have a LOT of options in the East Bay. There are some really nice places that show up in Rockridge that are reasonable and if you're ok with a little less nice of an area the NoBe area is good too. In Oakland you can do surprisingly well near Highway 13 in the foothills or nearish Mills College. If you don't mind the commute (I would) then Pleasanton is affordable (just) for large single-family homes, but it's a long ass commute. There's a ton in the Fremont/Hayward area if you're doing a South Bay commute tho, and that opens up Pleasanton a bit more too. If you're already driving to work then look to neighborhoods nowhere near BART as reasonable proximity to that can add a 1.5-2x multiplier to the price.
- wils1245 9y ago
  What’s a reasonable commute? If you’re in any of those places and commuting to SF you’re likely looking at an hour to get to work.
  - abritinthebay 9y ago
    It can be an hour to get to work if you live in SF. Just depends where you live and where you work (commute from the Sunset by bus to the FiDi - it’s going to take close to an hour). Whereas I live in Oakland and door to door it’s about 45mins if I time it right. So I’m not sure what your objection is. Working in a big city (be it SF, NYC, or London) means you’ll have commute time.
fageyogurtspoon 9y ago
Why not switch to remoting? At that salary you are probably quite senior in your organization.
alphonsegaston 9y ago
Maybe think about LA? You can make that salary and own a home easily. And the Armenian community there is great!
- linkregister 9y ago
  Los Angeles? Isn’t Los Angeles even worse for housing:income:commute?
  - alphonsegaston 9y ago
    Commutes are on par with San Francisco, but housing and income aren’t as bad yet. Wait another 5 years and they might be at parity with the Bay area. But the bay could even be further off the rails by then.
cdkee 9y ago
I'm 26, and I just bought a 2 bed 1 bath 850 sqft condo in Santa Clara for 570k. My payments are insane, basically 4k a month. I'm able to get by because my wife works too so we aren't entirely living hand to mouth. Since I bought in June, an identical condo in the same complex sold for around 600k. It really burns when you consider that even in Sacramento you could probably get a full sized single-family home for what I paid...just at the cost of being further away from work. I've been living in the Bay Area since I was 7, and I've almost been priced out of it. Does not feel good.
MystK 9y ago
I was born and lived in the Silicon Valley all my life. I think you're over-exaggerating the issue. https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1052-Montgomery-Ave-San-Bruno-CA-94066/15488979_zpid/ https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1052-Montgomery-Ave-San-B... Here's a 1200 SQFT 4 bedroom home in San Bruno for only 700k. The fact is that you are looking at homes over your budget, especially if you haven't saved a sizable down payment. Yes it's worse than other areas, but there are a lot of opportunities for people here.
- linkregister 9y ago
  What a bargain! How much should a household earn in order to afford that house? Assuming the $150k down payment.
  - MystK 9y ago
    The monthly payment is a mere $3071 a month for 30 year and $4,429 for 15 year. With his income, he can comfortably afford a monthly payment of $7,140.
- linkregister 9y ago
  That house will sell for $850k. But yes, the OP should be able to easily afford it.
philgoetz 9y ago
You don't RENT in that area. You have to buy. Then you can sell it later, and get back all that extra money you were paid for living in a place with high housing costs.

mabbo 9y ago

Get out, man. The region isn't trying to help people like you, with families, it's trying to help the entrenched who bought 20 years ago. You may make less money in terms of income in most other cities, but your retirement savings will grow a lot faster regardless. I work on a traveling/remote team. One of my teammates lives in Chattanooga. His 3 bedroom house with I think 2 or 3 aces of land put him back a whopping $200,000.

nether 9y ago
Lots of places like this. Check out this 3-bedroom with front porch, backyard, for $70,000 in Iowa: https://www.zillow.com/homes/for_sale/IA/pmf,pf_pt/87001013_zpid/19_rid/0-70000_price/0-254_mp/priced_sort/44.115197,-89.637452,39.719863,-97.141114_rect/6_zm/ https://www.zillow.com/homes/for_sale/IA/pmf,pf_pt/87001013_...
- biesnecker 9y ago
  Ugh, look at the school ratings on that house, though. :-( Not that there aren't a lot of places in the country with good schools and affordable housing prices, but for a lot of people with kids schools matter as much or more than housing prices.
btrautsc 9y ago
Came to suggest this, cool that it already happened. Can confirm. Founder in Chattanooga. About 13 of our people live here / TN. Housing options (that appear) much better than in this thread with good public schools and sub-30 minute commute available. Specific ethnic communities may be harder to find. Pretty great housing from $250-600k all over the place

jraby3 9y ago

Wow that is a crazy rent. I also live with a wife and two kids in about a 1000 sq. ft. apartment and make a similar income (but pay $2k rent). I've been squirreling away $50k per year and buying cheap homes to help with passive income. Up to about $7k per month which helps a lot both in terms of future saving and investing and also with peace of mind if I ever lose my job.

cat199 9y ago
> squirreling away $50k per year If you can save that much, it's not really 'squirreling'..
- cisanti 9y ago
  The whole SV area is out of touch with reality.
breitling 9y ago
Hey - what area do you invest in? Mind if I ask you a couple questions? please email me at trackoid at gmail dot com I'm also interested in REI, but not sure where the returns are in this market.

3pt14159 9y ago

What's the plan though? Like, tuck away the money to buy a place somewhere else? Or are you waiting for a housing correction?

5706906c06c 9y ago
Option A, save to buy elsewhere. Option B, housing market correction, though unclear if that'll happen, so probably A. Option C, continue renting, save for kids college and retirement if I can't make it happen in the next 3-5 years, and realizing I'm being aggressively pessimistic.

srathi 9y ago

I'm in the exact same situation, minus the BART part. Not sure how long can I wait to buy a house. Also, If your commute is 30 min, then you are probably living around Fremont. Is the rent for 900sqft that high over there? This is touching SF territory.

5706906c06c 9y ago
San Bruno, pretty much SF territory. My family owned and lived in Fremont, and my brother's commute often hovered around 60+ minutes on BART.

dmode 9y ago

I am curious where you are looking to buy. I bought 2 years back, 3000 sqft in Easy Bay close to a million. Have you looked at places like Hayward Hills, Union City, Dublin, San Ramon etc. ?

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
5706906c06c 9y ago
Yes, Castro Valley, Hayward Hills, etc. Selfishly speaking, the issue with moving further out means longer commute + plus distance from the kids school, etc. At that point, I might as well move out of state.

netule 9y ago

I'm in the same boat. Been here since 2012 and feel like I've wasted the good part of my twenties on this place. I'm desperate to get out of here but I'm having a hard time saving money and finding a place I'd want to to move to. I'm only half jokingly considering becoming an off the grid hermit.

Consultant32452 9y ago

>The sad part, as a ethnic-minority, I have just found our community for my kids, etc. Can you expand on what this means? Have you faced a lot of racism in SF?

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
5706906c06c 9y ago
Oh no, I look like a white guy, I'm Armenian, which is a tiny community with literally one little school off of Brotherhood way. I wasn't one to care about that, but I have to tell you, whenever I take my kids to the birthday parties or some PTA event, I sort of feel at home. It's odd because up until now, I didn't care about any of that, but I suppose my mortality is helping me prioritize on what matters in life. It's a mental and very much, an emotional struggle having to compromise.

DarronWyke 9y ago

As someone who's originally from California (not the Bay Area, though), let me tell you this: the cost of living, for what you get, is astronomically high compared to other places. Here in North Texas, I make around 100k/yr, and due to cost of living I can squirrel a lot of that away. We have no state income tax, and our property tax, while high, isn't nearly as high as California's (and will vary depending upon which county you live in -- massively expanding counties like Collin will charge more than rural ones like Johnson). With that income I was easily able to buy a ~1800sqft two story house in a good neighborhood. My total consistent expenses for each month are maybe 2/3s that of your rent, which includes non-consumables like mortgage, insurance, utilities, etc. In all of this, of course, I don't have kids and my wife doesn't (currently) work. If your spouse does work, then your spending power here becomes so much greater. Trust me. Get out. It's the best decision I've ever made and there's absolutely no fucking way I would ever live in CA again.

_seemethere 9y ago
Having lived in both Texas and now California I do have to say that the higher taxes do provide for better public everything. Texas seems so far behind when it comes to things like parks, transportation, and publicly available goods that coming to California is like a dream. I'd happily pay more taxes to be able to have these things be available for everyone.
- DarronWyke 9y ago
  >parks, Been to a lot of very nice parks out here, nearly every city has one or more. Some of which are huge with large trails. >transportation, You might be confusing the Bay Area (or perhaps even LA) with all of California in general. I'm from San Diego originally. Public transportation there is a joke, plain and simple. BA and LA are both special in that regard. >and publicly available goods What is this?
dmode 9y ago
I have lived in Texas. It absolutely sucks in many ways. No real cities (yes, I have been to Austin, doesn't count). Nothing compared to California when it comes to recreation, vacations, day trips, road trips etc. Acceptance of LGBT lifestyles. Very church oriented (I am a non believer). Low salaries, tech opportunities in Dallas and Houston are not comparable to the Bay.

conanbatt 9y ago

That amount of money should suffice to mortgage a house if you can..people with less income buy houses in the area. However..remember that buying a house does not save you rent. You become an owner, so either you pay rent to the owner, or you stiff him, which happens to be you.

5706906c06c 9y ago
Definitely aware of the trade offs, doing the means test indicates I should own, I digress. There is an emotional component, which is the kids. I grew up moving from one continent to another with no sense of security. I don't want the same for my kids, they deserve stability in their lives, and I've convinced myself that as a provider I need to make that happen for them.
- MystK 9y ago
  Renting a place you don't own is definitely unstable.

groupthink-- 9y ago

take my word for it, do it for your kids and stay in california. figure out a way to make the money. just figure it out dude. rent forever if you have to, and don't tell anyone. do whatever it takes. being harassed and ridiculed endlessly for being non-white (i'm guessing asian or indian) somewhere inexpensive and 90% homogenous (white or hispanic or black) will produce extremely negative results, to put it mildly. dealing with racism on TV and in movies is one thing, dealing with it in real life is an entirely different proposition.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

jerf 9y ago

"The sad part, as a ethnic-minority, I have just found our community for my kids, etc. It would be really tragic if I have to tear my kids away from that." Contrary to apparently-popular belief (based on some other comments in this thread), the Bay Area is not the only place in the United States with ethnic-minority communities/enclaves, or the only region in the entire United States where "brown people" are not, apparently, shot on sight. Otherwise, how could there be articles about how "white" is on the verge of becoming a minority? (I won't deny that the Bay Area is very, very liberal, but you're really in a filter bubble if you think it's the only one, or even remotely close to describable that way.)

groupthink-- 9y ago
if by "brown people" you mean hispanic, that doesn't do much good for OP, who is most likely asian or indian. hispanic kids are even worse than white kids when it comes to making life hell for asian kids.
- amyjess 9y ago
  Still plenty of places in the country where there are large Indian communities. There are a lot of Indians in Dallas; GP can come here. Or if GP doesn't want to live in a solid red state, there's always Millbourne, PA, which is over 40% Indian.
- 5706906c06c 9y ago
  Armenian, actually, and that reduces the numbers to a very small population here, Fresno and L.A. Edit: there are other communities on the East Coast AFAIK, but I would be trading this for that.
  - junkcollector 9y ago
    Dallas specifically has a sizeable and vibrant Armenian community in the northern suburbs which also have very good schools and are affordable when compared to anywhere in Cali. North of Dallas is also a significant tech hub.

dragontamer 9y ago

> The sad part, as a ethnic-minority, I have just found our community for my kids, etc. California has a number of Asian communities, but depending on which culture you want... there are plenty of other cities out there. Filipinos are basically everywhere in the USA as far as I can tell... Vietnamese and Koreans are a bit more rare but still exist in virtually every major Metropolian area in the USA (New York, DC, Austin). A bit of exploration / tourism can go a long way. Visit other cities and look for a new home. Locals often can point you the way towards "Chinatowns" (even if they're mostly Vietnamese or whatever).

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

abritinthebay 9y ago

If you are paying that much in rent you can afford a mortgage on a larger place that’s a reasonable commute to the city. Now it'll likely be a condo, not a single-family home (that'll be more, or further way, or not as nice) but it's doable for sure. Not in SF, but just outside (Oakland, Fremont, Daly City, etc) What you can get will depend on what you can wrangle as a deposit but there are plenty of options if you can get 10% down. Source: it’s what I did recently and I pay less than that for a 1300sq ft place in Oakland

5706906c06c 9y ago
I looked over 35th ave, which is fairly decent. Are there other pockets I should be looking at?
- abritinthebay 9y ago
  It's amazing what comes up. A lot depends on your deposit. If you can swing a total cost of ~$750-850k home price then you have a LOT of options in the East Bay. There are some really nice places that show up in Rockridge that are reasonable and if you're ok with a little less nice of an area the NoBe area is good too. In Oakland you can do surprisingly well near Highway 13 in the foothills or nearish Mills College. If you don't mind the commute (I would) then Pleasanton is affordable (just) for large single-family homes, but it's a long ass commute. There's a ton in the Fremont/Hayward area if you're doing a South Bay commute tho, and that opens up Pleasanton a bit more too. If you're already driving to work then look to neighborhoods nowhere near BART as reasonable proximity to that can add a 1.5-2x multiplier to the price.
wils1245 9y ago
What’s a reasonable commute? If you’re in any of those places and commuting to SF you’re likely looking at an hour to get to work.
- abritinthebay 9y ago
  It can be an hour to get to work if you live in SF. Just depends where you live and where you work (commute from the Sunset by bus to the FiDi - it’s going to take close to an hour). Whereas I live in Oakland and door to door it’s about 45mins if I time it right. So I’m not sure what your objection is. Working in a big city (be it SF, NYC, or London) means you’ll have commute time.

fageyogurtspoon 9y ago

Why not switch to remoting? At that salary you are probably quite senior in your organization.

alphonsegaston 9y ago

Maybe think about LA? You can make that salary and own a home easily. And the Armenian community there is great!

linkregister 9y ago
Los Angeles? Isn’t Los Angeles even worse for housing:income:commute?
- alphonsegaston 9y ago
  Commutes are on par with San Francisco, but housing and income aren’t as bad yet. Wait another 5 years and they might be at parity with the Bay area. But the bay could even be further off the rails by then.

cdkee 9y ago

I'm 26, and I just bought a 2 bed 1 bath 850 sqft condo in Santa Clara for 570k. My payments are insane, basically 4k a month. I'm able to get by because my wife works too so we aren't entirely living hand to mouth. Since I bought in June, an identical condo in the same complex sold for around 600k. It really burns when you consider that even in Sacramento you could probably get a full sized single-family home for what I paid...just at the cost of being further away from work. I've been living in the Bay Area since I was 7, and I've almost been priced out of it. Does not feel good.

MystK 9y ago

I was born and lived in the Silicon Valley all my life. I think you're over-exaggerating the issue. https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1052-Montgomery-Ave-San-Bruno-CA-94066/15488979_zpid/ https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1052-Montgomery-Ave-San-B... Here's a 1200 SQFT 4 bedroom home in San Bruno for only 700k. The fact is that you are looking at homes over your budget, especially if you haven't saved a sizable down payment. Yes it's worse than other areas, but there are a lot of opportunities for people here.

linkregister 9y ago
What a bargain! How much should a household earn in order to afford that house? Assuming the $150k down payment.
- MystK 9y ago
  The monthly payment is a mere $3071 a month for 30 year and $4,429 for 15 year. With his income, he can comfortably afford a monthly payment of $7,140.
linkregister 9y ago
That house will sell for $850k. But yes, the OP should be able to easily afford it.

philgoetz 9y ago

You don't RENT in that area. You have to buy. Then you can sell it later, and get back all that extra money you were paid for living in a place with high housing costs.