I live in a medium COL and looking to have a career in the bay area eventually. Hopefully FANG, if not startups. Talking to other people about living there and they always mention how bad it is in terms of housing and tax. If i get a job as a swe with TC 100-140k in the bay area, how hard would it be to live there? What is it actually like? edit: no kids and i live a pretty frugal life. TC not really my main goal now, just trying to work at a tech company there TC: 50k YOE: 4 months
Depends your reasoning for living there.
And depends on the lifestyle you're accustomed to. If you want a detached house close to work with a guest room and a big backyard, sorry, nope. If you're cool with apartment living in a big city, it's perfectly feasible on that salary range.
To be fair you can get that lifestyle, but you'll definitely have a longer commute. Living in the city is expensive af but commute is super easy with BART or just biking/scootering
Do you have kids ? If yes, then it's hard to live in 140k, if you are single you can live king size.
FANG TC will be at least 180k for new grad. Good enough for single. Rent with others and in 2 years with TC bump you should be able to safe a significant amount for down payment for a entry level townhouse/condo
Simple answer: not too bad if your household income is > 400K with 2 kids
As referenced by others, the challenges here are housing and kids. While rents are high, buying is worse because there’s so much cash, lots of offers over asking and lots of cash offers. Also, public school districts vary a lot and day care and private school tuition are pricey. Outside of those things, the rent is high but it’s fine, you can still put savings away. For these reasons I think it’s common to move to the Bay Area after graduation, stay a few years to make some money, then bounce when you wanna do the family thing.
Its traffic everywhere thanks to dumb drivers Of course you are not going to live close to menlo parks and cupertinos unless you pay huge rents
100 is hard. The poverty line for a fam is 117k
If you want to live like you are in a hostel, deal with awful traffic, be concerned about homeless people pouring hot diarrhea in your head, it’s the place for you.
No kids! What's the problem. Just do it. If it's not working well, you can return.
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That TC will be fine if you’re single. I don’t think it’a nearly as bad as people make it out to be (provided you work someplace with good comp).
TC will be fine, but life will suck if you're single here haha.