Best weather in Bay Area? (San Diego, San Jose: houses, to live, vs.)

[ImRandy]

Redwood City is the obvious choice. After all it is "Climate Best by Government Test".

[sf.bonnie.sf]

Duh, its gotta be Redwood City. "Climate Best by Government Test." That's the city's slogan. A research project by the United States government found Redwood City to be at the center of one of the world's three best climates. (The other two? The Canary Islands and the Mediterranean Coast of North Africa.)

[511pf]

The East Bay (Oakland all the way to Dublin/Pleasanton in increasing order of sunniness) and South Bay (San Jose) are the sunniest parts of the Bay Area. You'd probably be able to go as far as Lafayette to stay in your 45 minute commute window. San Jose and the South Bay are 60-90 minutes from SF.

The only place even close to as gray as London is San Francisco itself, and even then you'll see a lot more sun than you're used to.

[tstieber]

Yeah, coming from London, I don't weather is going to be your main concern. You can do a climate comparison on weather.com between London and any other city. Looking at SF vs London, it looks like London has warmer summers for about 3 months, but SF is warmer the other 9 month (with the biggest differences in winter, where SF is much warmer). SF is rainier than London in winter, but much drier in summer. London seems to have year round rain, where we don't.

But I agree, SF has the coolest and cloudiest microclimate in much of California, so enjoy the sunshine of an inland city. San Jose claims to have 300 days of sunshine per year (as per the city website). And if you do a weather.com climate comparison, you'll see San Jose is much warmer than London every month of the year, day and night.

I grew up in eastern Walnut Creek (far inland) and loved the climate there. Although it tends to be one of the hotter microclimates in the Bay Area, that means moderate days can still be warm there. The warm/hot season out there is very long, and there is lots of sunshine. But in the winter, it does get a smidge colder than coastal areas or even San Jose. Someone mentioned frost. You won't get any, ever, in San Francisco, and little to none in San Jose, but you'll get some light frost on clear mornings farther inland. But, you can still grow all your palm trees, oranges, bougainvilleas, and other exotics that sulk in London. In fact, the climate in Walnut Creek is statistically almost identical to Jerusalem (and corroborated by Israeli friends who lived there).

You really can't go wrong, coming from, well, London!

[SFBayBoomer]

In order to give the best advice, it would be nice to know what sort of climate the original poster prefers—warmer or more temperate, for example.

[cupcakemuffin]

Thanks everyone for your very helpful insights and suggestions!

[evergraystate]

This thread needs less opinion and more data. Most of the Bay Area has excellent weather as long as you're not on the beach. I would focus on other factors.
http://www.city-data.com/top2/c474.html

[80skeys]

The South Bay (Silicon Valley, everything from basically Palo Alto to San Jose) has pretty much six months of unbroken sunny, cloudless days during the summer. A lot of the winter days are sunny too.

[80skeys]

Originally Posted by evergraystate

Most of the Bay Area has excellent weather as long as you're not on the beach.

Most of the people I work with who live in San Francisco would beg to differ.

[BayAreaHillbilly]

Sunset Western Gardening Guide Zone 16. I used to live in it, in the El Cerrito / Albany / Kensington border area. I think it's also found in parts of Marin. It has all the benefits of Zones 15 and 17, but has cold air drainage in the winter. It's just as frost free as the Outer Richmond or Daly City, but with less coastal fog. And because it's in a cold air drainage zone, Tule Fog in the winter is almost unheard of.