NorCal Housing
 

OK,

Where's a reasonably nice place to live that won't leave me house poor, and isn't too far a drive from KSFO?

Preferably somewhere with a nice little uncontrolled airport.

Pick any two and try again.

:D

Now that's funny!

But, I'm actually very interested in the "best" answer to that question as well.

Right now, my wife and I are east coasters and we'd love to make the move out west. I'm still in my first year and my wife is just starting, so Denver will be a few years out, optimistically still two years AT BEST.

So is SFO just that crazy that it just doesn't make sense?

SFO is a tough market to break into right now. You will be able to hold DEN as it is growing and will continue to as we take delivery of more 737's and a319's, so that's probably your best bet. Plus you won't take the California state income tax hit. Financially, California makes no sense.

But the weather

Look north of petaluma....less than a two hour drive and you can find some bargains (relatively speaking). Rohnert park, Santa rosa, Windsor.....good luck

I am interested in this as well... My research on Zillow hasn't yielded many options. Depending on the trips you may be interested in flying, it is feasible that a weekly commute as far as Tahoe (200 miles)or Reno might work. The bonus with Nevada is the lack of CA state taxes. The local bay area is expensive in all directions... Silicon Valley, Napa, Marin County,...

I forgot to mention Napa and Vallejo. East of petaluma and you might find some deals there. Tahoe is getting expensive and the traffic can be terrible depending on when you go due to all the weekend ski traffic. Reno is just a ****hole with a capital *. Remember the show Reno 911?

The cheapest bet is in the central valley around Sacramento or Stockton. About a 2hr drive to SFO in NON-rush hour which is only at night time just about. If your willing to live 3 hrs out, you can live in the Sierra foothills which is nice. Summers in the Central Valley are 100* plus, though.

Silicon Valley salaries and overseas investors have made the Bay Area unaffordable. You could try for Sec. 8, though. Lots of bums in my brother's neighborhood living in dumps worth 750K.

A small house will cost you 3000/mo to rent, at least.

Tons of pilots live in the Rocklin/Roseville area outside of Sac. 30 min south of Beale, 2 hours-ish northeast of SFO. Great schools and homes about 1/3 the price of the Bay Area. Lincoln airport is just up the road.

Vegas baby! If the CA cost of living is too much or you don't want to drive three hours to work, Vegas is not a bad option. It's a pretty easy commute to SFO with roughly 9 UAL flights a day plus another dozen on our competitors (most of whom fly Airbii, so two jumpseats). LAX/DEN are easily commutable as well so a lot of flexibility if things at UAL change, heaven forbid. NV has no state income tax and housing is still comparatively cheap, so the savings are considerable. The schools are not great, so you might consider private schooling if you have any kids who are entering elementary school. Otherwise, if I lived in Norcal I'd live within a reasonable drive of a BART station and take that to work to avoid the traffic misery.

So going with cadetdrivr's 2 out of 3 scenario, the best place is out near Pacifica.
I would however avoid the apartments that are in the news right now.
If you don't like the fog the next best area is in the east bay.
Check out Walnut Creek or Pleasanton/Livermore.
A little further out the road from Livermore is Brentwood/Discovery Bay.
All have small part time controlled airports.
The traffic from the North or South or from SAC is daunting to say the least; not that traffic from the east bay is much better.
These get pretty warm in summer but none are "over the hill" and in to the central valley.
Good Luck
Now if somebody could help me find our system timetable that would be wonderful.

Sierra foothills-2+30 to sfo, hour away from some of the best skiing in the world.

California:

1500 sq ft will cost $500,000 in the Bay Area, in a middle-class neighborhood.

Vallejo: some nice houses, cheaper, but terrible schools (despite new facilities and dedicated teachers).

State income tax: about 10% of your Federal income.

Sales tax: I think it is around 7% statewide, and 9% in the Bay Area.

Gas; $1.00-1.25 higher per gallon than the national average.

BART: limited hours; can't get to or from the SFO airport before 6 AM or after 1100 PM. Dirty trains; I often felt uneasy riding it. Some unsavory characters riding it. Pretty expensive fares compared to subways in other major cities.

Living way north, east, or south: fog in the central valley will make travel slow, impossible, or dangerous.

Traffic in the Bay Area: awful. Car insurance rates: high.

I grew up in the Bay Area; just recently sold my childhood home. Could have lived in it, or used it as a crashpad, and been senior in SFO.

No thanks. The weather is great; everything else is awful.

I toyed with living in Tahoe on the Nevada side, but houses there are expensive, and commuting more difficult than it seems.

Good luck with your decision.

If you can fly to work, check out Calaveras county, with an airport in San Andreas. It's about two hour drive to work, but I know of one United pilot that flies from the country airport to San Carlos for EVERY TRIP. I lived out there for 18 years .. it's up in the foothills and you can get land (5 acres) for under $70,000. Send me a pm with your phone number, I can talk to you for hours about all of your options.

Robert.

T38, I don't think you'll find those prices anywhere that actually touches the bay. In 2008 my brother in law bought a 950 sq ft house in a very "blue collar" neighborhood of San Mateo that hadn't been lived in for three years. Waist-high weeds in the front yard, ruptured hot water line somewhere in the concrete pad he had to find and dig out. All this for the bargain price of $580,000. Two years later and after a tear down to the studs and complete remodel, his wife and newborn finally had central heat. Even in the middle of the downturn home prices anywhere on the peninsula didn't retreat at all, just plateaud for a while. That same house now cost $800-900k, at least.

I grew up in the east bay, but bailed out years ago. Still love NorCal, but the Bay Area is insane.

Do you have kids? Recommend no closer than Vacaville along the 80 corridor if you look out west. Home prices drop off dramatically in that area until Davis. If I had to do it all over gain I would probably pick Davis. College town...good schools...low crime.

Sacramento - about 1.5 hour drive to SFO . Steer clear of Natomas, some areas of Elk Grove, and look carefully in South Sacramento. There is a small, uncontrolled airport south and west about 7 or 8 miles from Sacramento Executive , I think it is called Franklin Airport. Sacramento is a really affordable place to live. It's got lots of trees, rivers and nearby lakes

I grew up in the east bay, too. (abeam the outer marker/FAF for rwy 30 at KOAK). San Mateo is a little more expensive; so are the nicer parts of San Jose.

Another place, just north of Davis, that's off the beaten path is Woodland. I lived there in the 80's when I attended UC Davis. It's probably 1:45 drive to SFO, no traffic, 4:00+ in rush hour traffic.

Good luck.. After living in CA for over 40 years, my wife and I left for the East Coast. It's a wonderful state to live in, but it's not worth the price to live there anymore.

I commuted there for a several years. Flying back from Europe, the local pilots weren't paying attention to flying, there were looking to see how bad the traffic was. By 3 pm, rush hour was in full force.

Nice place to live, in theory.

BART may have limited hours, but when it isn't operating traffic is usually not a factor. Fares can be expensive all right, but bridge tolls ain't great either. If riding in from the end of the line at Pittsburg/Bay Point, you won't have to deal with too much riff raff compared to those you might encounter waiting on the platforms in SF/Oakland. Good reason to become an FFDO though!

Yeah, three; 5, 9 & 12.

Would love just to get Denver and be done with it, but I'd like to not overlook something like SFO if it's workable.

I don't live in NorCal, or even California for that matter, but I do have this question for those who would say that it's "not worth it" to live there:

If these areas that are so expensive are not "worth it" to live there, then why is there so much demand that is driving the housing market so high? Obviously lots of people are willing to pay to live there, creating demand and scarcity.

Always struck me that it's more expensive to live "somewhere" than it is to live "nowhere."

I live in the bay area. I wasn't born here or raised here.
I had lived in quite a few places and chose this place specifically.
In my humble opinion, I don't think there is any place that can beat it.
Without going in to detail, the area lacks nothing (within a couple hours).
I raised a couple of sons that have been in to every sport and/or outside activity imaginable and it is here (except Jai Alai).
Education can't be beat.
The weather is just incredible, you can also have anything you want within an hour but when you stay put it's beautiful.
I think that's why people work so hard to be here and stay here.

Speaking of BART...headed up to SF with my girlfriend in a couple weeks. Flying into SFO and out of OAK.

Any stops that have the unsavory people? Hotel is in union square.

The reason it's in such demand is because there is high pay for professionals and there is WORLDWIDE demand for housing which is limited due to geography and urban planning. Every immigrant who gets a job in silicon valley buys a house. Then he buys one for parents and/or in-laws, then one for rental. Then people from out of state and even far away as China buy up real estate for rental. 50% of housing is rental. Loads of houses have two or more families living in them. Public transportation is pretty available here, and the light rails are not patrolled for fare jumpers.

On top of all that, the weather is great, there are lots of good schools, and tons of low paid service jobs for the less educated. Kids don't leave home and just become part of multi-generational families. They can spend their money on stuff, because buying a home is simply impossible. During the downturn, Million dollar homes went down to 750, 500K homes dropped to 350-if you could find them. Outside of the bay whole neighborhoods were empty in places like Manteca, but NOT for sale. The banks got bail outs so they just sat on the homes, refusing to release them.

The key to living in the bay is live near where you work, or work late at night. Rush hour is 6am-10am, 2:30-7:30, but traffic jams occuring at any time of the day. The city planners are actually REDUCING lanes in many cities in order to put in (unprotected) bike lanes in which people don't feel safe riding in crazy rush hour traffic.

Blame silicon valley.

I've lived here for almost 20 years. BART into downtown from SFO is super-easy, unless your plane arrives late at night since BART stops running around 1130-ish.

Let's see...you'll find more than a few characters at any BART station from 24th St. Mission all the way along Market St to the Embarcadero. If you're staying in Union Square you'll probably want the Powell St. BART stop, and that'll put you right on Market St.

Honestly, if you're not comfortable with 'unsavory' people you probably don't want to come here...Market St., the Tenderloin and Union Square are full of homeless folks because the weather is mild and the city doles out plenty of services to the homeless. I grew up in NYC and we certainly have more homeless people per capita than NYC (at least it certainly seems that way.)

That said, I've never once been hassled beyond the usual "Got a dollar?"

When you take BART out to OAK you might see a few people getting on at the West Oakland and Fruitvale stops, who clearly have done some hard time in CA's state prison system. Fruitvale is where Oscar Grant was shot by a BART cop (you may have heard of the movie.) Perfectly safe during the day, though I would not walk around the Fruitvale neighborhood or West Oakland at night.

That said, SF is a pretty safe city. The worst thing that will happen to you in Union Square is that a homeless guy might start screaming at you for no apparent reason. Ignore him, and enjoy:

• Golden Gate Park...you can spend a couple days here and not see everything
• Golden Gate Bridge
• The restaurants! Oh, the restaurants.
• The awesome neighborhoods. Hayes Valley (fantastic restaurants and wine bars), Noe Valley, Cole Valley (hmm we seem to have a lot of Valleys), South Park, the Inner Richmond and Inner Sunset, the Mission District (world's best burritos)...Jackson Square, the Fillmore, Nob Hill...the list goes on and on.
•*Notice I left out Fisherman's Wharf. No locals ever go there. Ever.
• Escaping to gorgeous Sausalito, Tiburon, Angel Island, and Marin County
• Ocean Beach (bring warm clothes!)
• The Embarcadero
• Wine tasting in Sonoma, the Dry Creek Valley, or the Alexander Valley (note I left out Napa, for good reason. It's an overpriced zoo. The real wine fans go to the Dry Creek or Alexander Valleys.)

Enjoy!

I used to fly the American Aero Club's J-3 out of Natomas Airport. Flew all over the valley on the weekends at 65 mph and five hundred feet. Sad that airport is gone. Nice folks.

Spent a few days tooling around N of the city along the coast last spring with my kid. We drove up through Stinson Beach, Pt Reyes and up past Tomales to Bodega Bay.

When I win the lotto, I might just relocate. The whole place was gorgeous.

Rented an authentic Mercedes CL6.3 AMG on a lark from Hertz. 500+ HP and massive, just massive tires, calipers and rotors. That car went like hell and was 100% predictable and solid. Best 300 bucks I've ever spent. I did however, managed to get spanked by a Tesla. That car was astonishing as well.

Sac isn't bad. Davis would be the spot. Denver isn't that much cheaper and there is a reason people want to live here.

My problem is I moved to Denver 13 years ago. It's not expensive at all for me. Moving to Cali, which I would love to do, seems almost impossible. That is, unless I don't mind driving 2+ hours to work. Yuck.

You gotta just get into a groove: zen out on a couple of podcast/Audibe, or put on the Giants game and relax. You know it's an even year, right?

WAY better than being a slave to your mortgage.

The pilots who bought closer in to SFO over the past twenty years have seen a lot more house appreciation than those who bought in the far flung suburbs...

I don't doubt that, but we're talking about buying NOW. If I could have picked up a place in the bay in 1996, I'd be smiling big time, but since then you've seen home price increases that I cannot imagine being replicated again.

Besides, trying to swallow the mortgage on a $1.5M house on an a newhire salary (I believe that was the OP's situation) is, in a word, impossible. 100 miles away that same house in a good neighborhood could be bought at a third the price.

Dig these charts for,

The Bay Area:

http://www.realdatasf.com/wp-content...-included2.jpg

SF itself:

https://thefrontsteps.files.wordpres...7/image002.jpg

So 1+30 out of SFO isn't unreasonable then? Kind've spoiled right now with 8 acres and plenty of woods to dirtbike and atv on.

Surprised some suggest as far away as Tahoe.

I might start looking a bit more, but still have this idea that I'll hate myself after taxes and the like...

Right now, I'd say it's a stretch to say 1.5 hours is reasonable for a middle-upper income couple w/a kid. Given the mentality of the typical airline pilot, I'd say no chance in Hades to find reasonable. It's awful hard to say the drive is 1.5 hours without traffic cause Bay Area traffic is early and often. Sorry mate but rule number one about California; if you are going to dwell on the taxes, don't bother trying it.

You would have to sell your home in Denver since it's peaking and rent until the market in the bay tanks. Taxes are not that bad since property tax is so low. You could get a home in Benicia in the 500k range and be 15 mins to the BART. There are deals they just go quick.

If you were commuting to Oak 1.5 would be possible from Sac. Between 10-2 that would be possible at Sfo.

2 hours from Sac to SFO no traffic unless your willing to do 95mph down highway 80 , and we don't have mainline flying out of Oakland.

Foothills east of Stockton will give you most bang for your buck. Calaveras County has decent schools and land is reasonably cheap.

I'd also look in the Lodi area. Nice town about 15 mins North of Stockton .. that'd be right at 1+45 to SFO, no traffic.

Exactly. Not to mention that I was walking around in a t shirt and shorts today. One down side....you will likely have to mow your grass in January and February.