[bearishgurl]

I have a theory about moving to SF Bay area (for work) from So Cal. If you don’t like it, you can always move back. Meanwhile, you will likely have:

MORE $$ from the sale of your residence there (IF you don’t keep it as a (lucrative) rental;

MORE $$ in your 401K acct (as a percentage of your salary there plus employer match, if any;

Your last position was likely HIGHER (due to being in the right place at the right time), so you got more experience;

And most importantly, your LAST WAGE was HIGHER, so that is NOW the benchmark on what you are worth on your next gig . . . .

Ideally, if you are Gen Y and in high tech, accept a position there as early as possible in your career.

***************************************

Trying this in reverse doesn’t work out nearly as well.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=AN]…You providing data just reiterate my point. The San Mateo area have WORSE school than MM’s school. So, thanks for disproving your own statement about school. Similar properties in MM would go for low $300k. So, that’s ~50-60% higher. So, where’s the 0-25% higher you’re talking about?[/quote]

AN, I didn’t look at the school scores there but I can’t imagine that they’re that much lower than MM.

btw, I thought you posted somewhere that your kid was going to private school. If they are still attending private school, do you EVER plan on sending them to public school?

If not, why are you so focused on “school scores?”

And btw ~$320K / ~$455K is NOT “50-60%.” It is actually 29.3%. And you never even considered the upside potential of the $455K SM fixer (IF they get that much for it) vs a MM fixer for $320K.

If I was a GEN Y with the skills SV firms are currently looking for, I wouldn’t waste a second in moving up there, but that is just me. However, I never had any parents living here to help me with kids.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=squat250][quote=bearishgurl][quote=squat250]well, he’s filling out applications.

looks like the plan is engineering at CAl Poly pomona, Cal poly SLO…or maybe UC Riverside.

2090 SAT (96th percentile), 3.4 GPA.

5’s on Ap tests, inc chem and physics. finds calculus not hard.

it’s difficult to know where to point your children….

I think it’s going to be ok…but im not sure…thanks for the input…[/quote]

I think Cal Poly will offer your son the best college experience for his field of study. HOWEVER, he will not be able to live at home while attending.

With a 2090 SAT score, he’ll have no trouble at all getting accepted into any of those schools (3.4 GPA be damned).

Go ahead and make application to all. As you know, scaredy, the deadline is looming…[/quote]

im into the cheap live at home thing…

but…
maybe the right thing is to just suck it up and send him to cal poly somewhere…and let him go…

makes me sad…

i need him around…[/quote]

Doesn’t he have some younger siblings who can rake and ride a tractor mower, etc, etc??

SLO is a BEAUTIFUL town and it’s really not that far away …

[bearishgurl]

[quote=ucodegen]One of the best ways to ‘help your student’ when going to college, particularly if they are in a different location, is to buy rental property in that area. Kid is responsible for the roommates. In the 4 to 8 years that it takes to complete (depending upon degree and field of study), you come out ahead on the property, monthly payments help defer cost and it allows you to cover one of the largest costs of education these days – living costs.[/quote]

I agree and am looking into this ….

[bearishgurl]

[quote=AN][quote=bearishgurl]You must admit that the reasons you didn’t want to take a position in SV were all personal. Your choice to stay in SD “2-3 yrs ago” instead of pursue those SV positions and possibly buy a residence there did NOT cause your family to be “better off financially.” It allowed you to live the life you wanted to lead, i.e. you and/or your spouse to work less and be near family.

That’s the bottom line.[/quote]
Of course everything is personal. Else, everyone would be moving here instead of living there. It’s all about financial. That’s my point and that’s the point you tried to dispute. YOU state income is 40% higher while housing is 0-25% higher. I call BS on both. I provided data. Now, the ball is on your court. All I got is, MM is cheap because of x,y,z, but yet, you haven’t provided a single example of houses in the bay area that’s 0-25% more expensive. BTW, your x, y, z is ridiculous and a complete missinformation….[/quote]

AN, you tend you get yourself into an “argumentative loop” on here but if all your personal decisions were based on their financial impact to you and your family, you may have made very different decisions. Acc to your posts, the decisions you made to stay here were lifestyle decisions. I’m in the same boat but wish I could have left years ago. I still have a kid in HS.

OK, we’ll start with one of my FAV towns. Here’s a couple of “urban” listings in the middle of SM (listed at MM prices). One is a “moderate fixer.” Their lots are the same size or bigger than the avg lot in MM but both have so much more upside potential than MM (or ChulaV, for that matter) will EVER have:

1300 sf SM fixer REO – asking $455K.
http://www.redfin.com/CA/San-Mateo/317-S-Grant-St-94401/unit-S/home/2021409

1200 sf SM traditional sale – asking $499K.
http://www.redfin.com/CA/San-Mateo/227-N-Grant-St-94401/home/1451998

In my “cursory research” of current SM listings, I’m also noticing that 2012 flippers are asking $270-$300K more than they purchased the properties (fmr REOs) for! I haven’t even checked recent sales comps yet.

If these flippers are actually getting anywhere near their asking prices, they are really making bank on these fixers (barring any unforeseen structural problems) :=]

[bearishgurl]

[quote=AN]BG, thanks for a good laugh. Your knowledge of MM is hilarious at best and outrageously wrong at worse. Check out salary.com, weather.com, google map, zillow.com, do your research. Then come back with counter data if you have any. But right now, all I see is missinformations and/or extremely outdated information that’s no longer relevant. I’m not going to spend time debunking your silly missinformation. The appreciation in value between 2000 and now does not interest me or anyone who’s comparing the two cities today. Do you expect those same house in the bay to increase 400-600% in the next 12 years? If not, what’s the point of bringing that up? All I have to say is, data is proved you wrong. Accept and move on. Data in the mid 90s doesn’t count in this debate BTW.[/quote]

I haven’t finished with my current salary data project. And there are few … if any … cheaper “fixers” in the current listings in the bay area. Why?? Because they are snapped up before they even get listed (or get entered into the MLS), lol.

You must admit that the reasons you didn’t want to take a position in SV were all personal. Your choice to stay in SD “2-3 yrs ago” instead of pursue those SV positions and possibly buy a residence there did NOT cause your family to be “better off financially.” It allowed you to live the life you wanted to lead, i.e. you and/or your spouse to work less and be near family.

That’s the bottom line.

[bearishgurl]

I don’t know about the state, but county public law in CA provides for “mandatory retirement” at the age of 72. Since this SL debtor is already 71, I see his state pension (of which a portion is already offset by SS) AND his SS garnished until he dies. Not sure it will come to $3K per month, though.

There is absolutely no excuse for a person who has been a dentist for ~30 years to still be carrying any kind of personal student debt at all.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=UCGal]If he’d been astute – he would have declared bk before the laws changed a while back… Student loan debt used to be dischargable.

And there’s a lesson to learn from this for astute piggs…. Don’t cosign student loans with your kids. They can and DO garnish your social security when you’re retired if your kids default on the loans. I’m not saying don’t help you kids in college… But there are ways to do it that won’t involve eating cat food in retirement because you’re not getting the soc sec. you expected.[/quote]

Good advice, UCGal.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=squat250]well, he’s filling out applications.

looks like the plan is engineering at CAl Poly pomona, Cal poly SLO…or maybe UC Riverside.

2090 SAT (96th percentile), 3.4 GPA.

5’s on Ap tests, inc chem and physics. finds calculus not hard.

it’s difficult to know where to point your children….

I think it’s going to be ok…but im not sure…thanks for the input…[/quote]

I think Cal Poly will offer your son the best college experience for his field of study. HOWEVER, he will not be able to live at home while attending.

With a 2090 SAT score, he’ll have no trouble at all getting accepted into any of those schools (3.4 GPA be damned).

Go ahead and make application to all. As you know, scaredy, the deadline is looming…

[bearishgurl]

[quote=no_such_reality][quote=bearishgurl][quote=no_such_reality]LOL, so you’re saying Government jobs pay 40% more in the bay area than here.[/quote]

I’m saying most of them did the four bay-area counties we checked in the ’90’s which qualified population-wise.[/quote]
You don’t think you should look at more than Government jobs?[/quote]

I’ve got a few “private” positions in the FIRE industries I’m researching as well.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=no_such_reality]LOL, so you’re saying Government jobs pay 40% more in the bay area than here.[/quote]

I’m saying most of them did the four bay-area counties we checked in the ’90’s which qualified population-wise.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=AN][quote=spdrun]Again, housing expectations are purely local. Yeah, you will get a 3/1 or 3/2 for $600k instead of a 4/3 on more land. That doesn’t make it a worse place to live, just a DIFFERENT place to live.[/quote]
No, it makes it A LOT more expensive to live all the while, the pay is not that much more. Which was my point. BG tried to say pay was 40% more while housing is 0-25% more. I completely debunked that with DATA. Now, you’re saying a 3/1 or 3/2 is 80-100% more than SD while pay is 15-25% more? Yeah, no thanks. Which is why I didn’t move up there. I want to escape the rat race, not get deeper in it. If I move up there, my chance of retiring early diminish to almost 0. So, please explain to me why it’s entirely worth it for gen Y to get deeper in the rat race by living in an area that pay 15-25% while the same living standard would cost them 80-100% more?

I know the two places are different. Every place is different. There’s no point in debating that places are different because there are no two places that are the same. But, it does make it a worse place to live when it put you that much deeper in the rat race.

Now, back to my original statement, which is, the Bay area folks are more likely to have to pay this new tax. An average S/W Engineer 5 in Palo Alto makes around $143k in Palo Alto while a similar Engineer in SD makes $123k. Since SD is a lot cheaper to live, one can choose to live on a single income with $123k salary and still live very well. in the bay, it’s much harder to live on a single $143k income. So, if both spouses work, their combined income is $286k. They will be hit with this new tax. Even if the couple in SD decide to have double income. If they have similar income at $123k, their combined is only $246k, which means they still won’t be affected by this new tax. So, yea, I still stand by my original point that the W-2 folks in the bay area will be most affected by this.[/quote]

AN, I started a salary comparison of current local government openings for six bay area counties plus SD County. It is not yet complete. My 40% higher statement was from our local-government salary surveys of CA counties which had a population of over 1M (for bargaining-table use in ’94 and ’98) and four of the six bay-area counties had salaries of over 40% more than SD for the majority of identical classifications at that time. I’ll post it as soon as I identify the identical or nearly identical classifications for comparison.

I realize residential RE values have nearly quadrupled in several cities of least 2 bay-area counties since 1998.

I can’t put my finger on it here but I’m getting a bit of whining or lamenting from your posts. You stated you interviewed in SV for positions in your field (2-3 yrs ago? … not sure) and those positions paid ~25% more than SD at the time but you considered that your life would be a “rat race” there so elected not to pursue any of the positions further. You stated you want to retire “early.” You also state that you don’t wish your spouse to work very much (or work at all). I don’t know how many kids you have but if your spouse doesn’t bring in any income and you have no regular “passive income stream,” I don’t care WHAT kind of engineer you are, you will limit yourself in coastal CA counties to owning in the lesser-expensive areas.

Correct me if I’m wrong here, AN. From your former posts, my understanding is that you grew up in MM and you currently reside within a block or blocks of your parents. Your spouse is a nurse (RN or LVN). Nurses typically work in shifts, negating the need for expensive child care bills. I don’t see how you and your spouse would be hit with AMT if she worked FT as a nurse and you continued to hold your position.

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to live near other family members while raising your family and there’s nothing wrong with an educated mom (and her spouse) deciding not to use her education to bring in money while raising young kids. These are choices you have chosen for yourselves. For these choices, you forego positions (at least for YOU, anyway) of higher visibility at a (likely) company HQ where you may be able to move up faster or get many different kinds of experience, making you ultimately more marketable.

The choices you have made to not accept a higher-paying, higher-visibility SV position (2-3 yrs ago?) was due to how you perceive your family should be living. If you didn’t have a family (or had one AFTER you established yourself professionally in SV), you might have made a much different choice.

It might interest you to know that residential RE has doubled in value in the last three years in the SV communities you mentioned here. I personally toured mid-century ranch listings (avg 2300 sf) on ~1/2 AC lots in Saratoga (SC Co) in 2000. At that time, several cosmetic fixers could be had there for $270-$300K!

I don’t know when you purchased your MM residence but I highly doubt MM RE has gone up 400-600% since 2000, as parts of SV have.

Ask yourself why this is so.

I have a couple of questions for you, AN:

What was the price (approx or range) you paid for your MM property?

What year did you purchase it in?

Did it have all the BR/BA and same size garage it does now in it when you purchased it?

How much did you spend since you purchased your residence to get it like it is today?

How much do you think your residence is worth today?

****

I’m not trying to “research” your property here. I don’t CARE. The point I’m trying to make is that even though MM has recently gone up in value, after costs of sale, you may or may not be able to recover your expenses of upgrade/remodeling upon sale today and still come out ahead.

OTOH, had you accepted a position in SV ~3 yrs ago and bought a 3/1 or 3/1.5 (as spdrun suggested) and installed another shower or added a master suite, etc, your property would now be worth at least 200% over what your paid for it AND sunk into improvements!

I understand MM is now very convenient to tech jobs in SD. But MM is by no stretch of the imagination comparable to SM or SC counties. I don’t need to tell you that MM is a flat mesa, an “irrigated desert” subject to heat. It is an “upzoned” part of a a very large city (SD) which currently has under construction big box stores and several very large multifamily projects. Due to SD’s “General Plan, this will continue until there is absolutely no space whatsoever left to build on in MM. I don’t have to tell you that it’s already very hard to parallel-park on many streets there.

OTOH, nearly ALL of the cities in SV (both SM AND SC counties) have been “downzoned” by their respective governments for many, many years. Nearly half of both of these counties is dedicated open space developed into state parks and county parks, including horse trails. Save for the infamous “Foster City” dredging project, there have been no CFD’s formed in SM County, nor will there ever be any. There are very few “big box” retailers (if any) in SM county. “Scaled-down” versions of big box retailers in SF are typically built below the street level. There are no “franchises” allowed (or business signs higher than ~30 feet) in 3-4 cities in Marin Co. Because of these “quality-of-life” differences (and more) MM is not comparable to those small cities in SV (near tech jobs) and never will be.

I’m not “condemning” MM here OR your life choices. But having lived and traveled extensively in the bay area, I see it as it was in the 60’s all the way to the present. Likewise, I see SD as it was in the ’70’s all the way to the present. I don’t believe one can fully understand what it is unless they also understand what it was. Comparing your life here to how it would be there (or would have been had you accepted a position and purchased a residence there) is comparing apples and oranges, IMHO.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=CA renter]ctr (or is it “Almighty Financial Genius,” as you’ve implied to us “financially ignorant/illiterate” types in other threads?),

Here you go:

“The result of Proposition 13’s nearly 60 percent cut in California’s
local property taxes is illustrated in Figure One. In 1977-78, the last fiscal year before the imposition of
Proposition 13, nearly 28 percent of state and local general revenue generated in the state came from
property taxation. California’s property tax reliance was 26 percent greater than the reliance exhibited in
all states in 1977-78.
1
By 2005-06, the most recent fiscal year for which data is available, California’s
reliance on property taxation as a source of state and local general revenue had fallen to less than 13
percent. This was 24 percent below the property tax reliance occurring throughout the rest of the United
States in 2005-06.” [pg. 2]

…What this indicates, and what many observers have
repeatedly pointed out, is that the changes in California’s revenue structure that began with Proposition 13
has resulted in a persistent structural deficit in this century that, despite repeated calls to do otherwise,
was not dealt with during the economic recovery the state experienced between 2003 and mid 2007. [pg. 13]

…

[Because of Prop 13, California has had to shift revenue sources to personal income and corporate taxes, which leads to much more volatile swings in revenue, and this causes…]

California’s economic situation continued to decline in March and April of 2008. Given the
state’s heavy reliance on personal income taxes, analysts expected the two-year deficit value to rise. By
mid April, many said it was back to an amount similar to what it was before the one-time cuts made in the
special session of the legislature. In late April of 2008, Governor Schwarzenegger shocked many by
publicly stating that he believed the current two-year deficit figure to be over $20 billion. The exact
figure will not be known until after a May revise that accounts for the actual amount of personal and
corporate income taxes collected by the state. [pg. 15]

http://www.csus.edu/indiv/w/wassmerr/denial.pdf
——————

Also, you might try inform yourself, Mr. Financial Genius, about where California’s revenue goes. California’s pension costs comprise ~3-5% of the state’s budget. This is not what’s “sucking the lifeblood” out of this state or country.

The loss of revenues that resulted from Prop 13 (even if you only count second homes/investments, commercial properties, and corporate-owned land, leaving Prop 13 intact for a single primary residence) totally dwarfs the problems caused by those “awful union goons” and their pensions.

Stop regurgitating right-wing talking points and really inform yourself using actual facts and data.[/quote]

Thanks for your excellent research on this subject, CAR!

[bearishgurl]

[quote=spdrun]If the garage in SD is making enough money to support the owner and his employees, why would it want to expand? Not everyone wants the tsuris of managing many employees.[/quote]

The garage in Tulsa worked on several different makes of (foreign) vehicles and so its mechanics had several different certifications. That is why it was bigger. The garage in SD are family-owned and operated Toyota certified mechanics.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=ltsdd][quote=spdrun]What y’all don’t realize is that other places have un-capped property taxes. So CA is just making up revenue that would come from R.E. taxes in other states.
[/quote]

+1

People also don’t realize that moving out of CA to get away from higher taxes only solve the cost side of the business. They neglect to take into account the impact of moving to a place like Tulsa would have on revenue side.[/quote]

The repair I had done in Tulsa cost only $3.75 less than my mechanic in SD would have charged me for it (I checked). The garage in Tulsa recently expanded to 5-6 bays and got new expensive testing equipment for German makes where my longtime garage is SD (Japanese only) has had the same three bays for the last 20 years. Both garages have PLENTY of business, often having to schedule it out to fit it all in 🙂

I don’t know if it cost any less to do biz in Tulsa (the lease, maybe?) but DO know that the Tulsa garage definitely had a few more employees.

[Author]

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