Single Mother Wanting To Move To California (Los Angeles, San Jose: for sale, real estate)

[Chuck5000]

I think it is not at all wise for anyone to relocate to coastal Northern or Southern California with children if they're coming from a decent middle class level elsewhere in the USA unless they will have very high incomes in CA and strong future prospects. It's just too expensive. You will be dropping down too much.

The least expensive parts of CA are not that nice or are very, very remote. The medium-expensive parts can be nice, but medium expensive for CA is equal to the most expensive parts of almost every other state.

Look online carefully at costs of both sale and rental housing. You can try Redfin and Zillow, and city-data.com has price maps that are useful also. Craigslist.org is the place to look at rental prices.

You could look at the Sierra towns if it's not too far from everything. You could look at Ventura or Oxnard - the forums here have some good info.

Use usclimatedata.com to understand CA's weather. There is a lot of variation. The bad news is that the sunny and prefect weather you dream about is in the extremely expensive places.

Generally, northern CA is more expensive than southern CA - you can definitely find more value in the greater LA or SD areas than you can in the greater Bay Area.

Given that you're in education, I wish I could be more optimistic about you earning enough, but maybe you could target parts of the state where you could do better, where they may be higher demand for your skills, and therefore you could have more security. You could ask others who are teachers. You could find other forum sites where they discuss relocation. You could also try specific sub forums on this site asking about specific career paths. You could also try reddit.com.

I can tell you that the Bay Area is brutal for people in professions like yours unless they have family here already that can help with housing.

[nightlysparrow]

Here is the pay scale for Los Angeles USD:http://achieve.lausd.net/cms/lib08/C...0Table_1-6.pdf

With a masters you can also teach in a community college: https://www.cccregistry.org/jobs/index.aspx

[Ruth4Truth]

Originally Posted by family_first

I recently visited San Francisco California and I absolutely loved it. It reminded me of home NYC in some ways. I am a single mother of three. My daughter will be attending college in CA and 2016-2017 will be my oldest sons last year in HS then off to college he goes. So by August 2017 it will be me and my baby boy currently 7 1/2 months old. I really am considering moving to CA and have been doing my research on different areas. I have my BA in Child Developmet and currently working on my Masters in Education plus my teaching certification. I am currently a preschool teacher but would like to work with older children. I plan to find a job in my field in or outside the classroom working with children before I move any where. I guess I am looking for some feedback as to what parts of CA is more affordable than others, what parts is best recommended to raise my son, what parts is best for a single mother who would be living off of a teacher's salary? I know CA is very expensive place to live but like everywhere some cities are more costly than others. Thanks in advance to everyone's feedback.

Have you looked into CA requirements for teacher certification? In the past, teachers moving to CA have said they had to take extra coursework in-state to qualify.

[2sleepy]

Originally Posted by Perma Bear

What's hotter than Sac? Hell?

No, actually there are a number of places hotter than Sacramento. Fresno, Las Vegas, Phoenix, should I go on?

[sarahhorselover]

If you have your heart set on being somewhat close to San Francisco while still living somewhere that's not horribly expensive, I'd recommend looking at East Contra Costa County (Oakley/Brentwood/Knightsen/Byron). It's close enough that you can visit The City if you want (I can't understand why anyone would want to visit that concrete jungle, but to each his own), but far enough away that it's still affordable. You could even live in the nicer areas of Antioch, but you'd have to secure a teaching job in one of the cities listed above so your child could attend school there instead of Antioch. Do not send your child to Antioch schools!

There are plenty of affordable apartments in this area, but you'd definitely want to visit and get a feel for the different neighborhoods, especially if you were going to even consider Antioch. There are also some ranches in Knightsen, Byron, and some of the remaining rural parts of Oakley with in-law units for rent. You just have to keep your eye on craigslist for when they come available.

However, if you were to go out this far, you'd want a job out this way as well. The traffic is a flipping nightmare to go anywhere else. You'd pretty much have to secure a teaching job in East Contra Costa or else you'd spend your life commuting on the wretched Highway 4. The good news for you (bad news for me because I hate people and traffic) is that since the economy has been picking back up, so has the housing construction out here. And with more housing comes more kids, and with more kids comes more demand for teachers. There is already at least one more school opening just next year with more plans to build schools in the near future.

But as others have already said, make sure this is something you really want. California prices are insane and living on one income would be very difficult unless you are willing to make sacrifices (like living way out in East Contra Costa). Good luck to you!

[sourdough]

Originally Posted by scootad

Sacramento is a great place to live. Within striking distance of the SF Bay Area, wine country, Lake Tahoe, affordable, pleasant weather year round. The summer is hotter than coastal CA but far more comfortable than 95% of the rest of the country's summer weather as it cools down at night and tons of trees with shade in the city. Good restaurants, nice midtown, decent arts scene with museums, excellent produce.

[CA4Now]

Originally Posted by family_first

2016-2017 will be my oldest sons last year in HS then off to college he goes.

You're thinking of uprooting a senior in high school? That will be a challenge.

[2sleepy]

Originally Posted by JohnS_15

You could also look north of San Francisco at areas of Sonoma county. It's more affordable up there and you'd still be reasonably close to SF and closer to the coast with very pretty surroundings. The nice thing about being a teacher is that you are not tied to a ultra-competitive extremely expensive metropolitan area like SF and it's surrounding. Good luck.

where are the affordable areas in Sonoma County? Rohnert Park is probably the most affordable area and I don't think she would find a 3 bdrm rental for under $2200 a month and starting teacher salary for that school district is 42K

It's getting tougher all the time for teachers and many public sector workers to be able to live where they work in California, the options that I am aware of in Northern California are:

• Butte County
• Yuba County
• Remote parts of Lassen and Mendocino County
• Far north part of state, i.e. Eureka, Arcata, Crescent City
• Lake County
• Parts of Solano County
• Sacramento
• Eastern Contra Costa County

We looked at each of those places when we were relocating to California from Nevada and quickly crossed them all of our list except for Sacramento.

[2sleepy]

Originally Posted by CA4Now

You're thinking of uprooting a senior in high school? That will be a challenge.

yep, and I'm wondering about the child who will attend college in California this year, unless I'm missing something they will be paying non-resident tuition.

[Ruth4Truth]

Originally Posted by 2sleepy

yep, and I'm wondering about the child who will attend college in California this year, unless I'm missing something they will be paying non-resident tuition.

Maybe the daughter has her financial aid already worked out. My concern is more in the realm of how to support the other two kids anywhere in the Bay Area on a teacher's salary. She would do a lot better to wait until the HS senior graduates and goes off to college. Then she'd only need a 1-br. apt. for herself and the infant/toddler. After she gets established as a teacher and has had a few pay increases, she can get a 2-br. If she can score an apt. in Mill Valley for 2 years, she can apply to their subsidized housing program for public servants, and get a 2-br. there.

OP, these kinds of decisions are what you're facing if you want to move to the Bay Area. Frankly, even singles with no kids have trouble paying rent and managing the COL as teachers. But you need to look into the teacher certification req's before you spin your dreams. And I agree you'd definitely get more bang for your buck in the Sacramento area.