When you say you need a "lot" of money to live in the Bay Area... (renting, to move)

[sonarrat]

Originally Posted by bayarea-girl

Gizmo, I have worked both in the East Bay and in SFran and in all my jobs I had to pay for parking. One of the companies I worked for owned their own building and still charged people to park. Most companies don't own their building and or there is no parking available at the office site so an employee has to pay, companies just don't pay. You got lucky if you didn't have to pay for parking. Every place I worked does reimburse for travel expenses which of course is different from parking spaces.

I've worked in San Jose, Mountain View, South San Francisco and Burlingame and never paid for parking. Even when I was a student at SJSU, I would park at a light-rail station and ride the train using a free Eco Pass given to me by the college.

[bayarea-girl]

sonarrat, again if you didn't have pay then you got very lucky. At my husband's last job he didn't have to pay for parking (at least he didn't have to pay for the last 3 years before they acquired their own building, prior to that they leased a space which employees had to pay for a parking spot). Now if he uses his car at his new office he has to pay $150/month. Most people I know don't want the headache/additional expense of commuting along with having to pay for parking so they carpool or BART to avoid having to pay for something the employer should pay for.

[Nella925]

Originally Posted by bayarea-girl

Cardinal2007, some apartment buildings provide 1 parking space that is true but usually build the space cost into the lease. Secondly, you will find where parking is an issue (which is most of the Bay area) that you do have to pay for additional for 1 parking space. At least that was a fact when I first moved to the Bay. When I first moved to the I had to spend $80 for parking it wasn't given to me. Then when I moved in with my husband he was already paying $50 for his parking space and there wasn't a space available for me to park my car, so I had to park it outside. Couple of friends of mine that bought a condo had to pay for a parking space.

You are providing miss information to people if you say that you can rent a place in the East Bay for less than the rates you provided. You can do so but how would you be living? Probably in not of a so nice area. Rents in the East Bay are higher than the figure you are providing.

DC is just as expensive as the Bay true. But who is comparing the Bay to DC?

It is true that you have to pay to park at the BART station. Most BART stations are NOT FREE. I'm not sure how often the Bart parking site gets updated but the cost is more at Ashby and Richmond/El Cerrito stations. The daily costs add up so it is not cheap to park. Also most employers make their employees pay for parking which in other parts of the country it is free to park in the company parking lot.

Living in the Bay just is not cheap.

my mom parks at bart and its FREE...but before 9 or 10am if you want to park in the closest spot you have to pay for the permit for the day but the other spots cost nothing...but after 9 or 10am any spot is free...

and there's a lot of generalizing going on...the bay area is wayy too diverse to lump it all into one.

[bayarea-girl]

Nella925, in some stations it is free to park after 10AM but you have to find a space or you will have to pay. Most people have to park before 10AM. The stations are usually PACKED at around 8AM.

Sure the bay is very diverse wasn't trying to tackle the diversity on this post. Just wanted to communicate costs that I have experienced and ones that others moving to the bay should be mindful of.

[cardinal2007]

I think most major employers own their own offices, lease rates are pretty expensive for being commercial properties, even with a recession going on I can't find any place for $2/sqft or less. Most things seem to be getting cheaper now, certainly seems to be a deflationary environment right now, but BART and Caltrain are raising their costs. BART should increase their parking fees instead of raising fares if their lots fill up that early.

As for being able to take BART to work, I think most people don't really have that option, that is why out of 7.2 million people in the Bay Area, about 190,000 use BART daily (twice a day, making 380k rides). Especially in Silicon Valley most employers are not close to BART or Caltrain station. The only good office area in the suburbs I know you can take BART to are Pleasanton offices of Kaiser, and Oracle, and offices in downtown Walnut Creek, and Pleasant Hill, and that's about it.

If you think about the Bay Area, it is huge, using the 9 county area it includes Cloverdale off at the far north, Gilroy at the far south, the large cities of San Jose, San Francisco, and Oakland, and on the far eastern ends Brentwood, and Livermore. They all have vastly different costs of living, even with San Francisco itself. It varies, from 1,360 sqft townhouse in Hunter's Point for $175k, to a 1,583 sqft house in Russian Hill for $2.6M. You can buy houses in Richmond or Oakland for less than $100k, but I wouldn't suggest it. the amount of money you need to live here depends on your needs, and where exactly you want to live.

I will tell you this much, 3 years ago the amount of money needed to live in most of the Bay Area was a lot more, houses in Brentwood cost twice as much back then, you couldn't drive out of the Bay Area to look for affordable housing, houses all the way out to Modesto cost over $300k. If you're looking to eventually buy your own place, you would be moving in at a much better time.

Gizmo, is Marina Bay (Richmond), a safe place?, that city has pretty bad crime statistics, but aggregates don't tell the whole story obviously.

[bayarea-girl]

Cardinal2007, I doubt that most employers own their own buildings. All the businesses in SF don't own the space (they lease it). I couldn't say how many people ride the BART but commuting is expensive as is the parking fees. I think that if the BART ran into Marin there would be an increase in ridership. There are too many people I know that live in San Leandro, Walnut Creek, Lafayette, Alameda, Berkeley, etc. that have to use the Bart to go to work in SF or Oakland.

I would agree with you that things have gone down in terms of rental and purchases which is making it a bit more affordable, but the bay is still expensive (San Jose, SF, & Marin, Walnut Creek are still really expensive).

[mdwstrnkid]

Originally Posted by bayarea-girl

Cardinal2007, I doubt that most employers own their own buildings. All the businesses in SF don't own the space (they lease it).

As far as I know, most business do not own their own buildings. Most of the bigger office complexes are owned by real estate holding and development companies or large financial institutions.

[cardinal2007]

Stanford is the only place I've paid for parking. Of all the people I know that don't work in the city, Berkeley or Oakland, I know of no one who pays for parking. I'm not really talking about SF since most people don't work in the city.

I would say major employees do own their properties for financial reasons, small and mid-size businesses, and expanding businesses lease space due to the fact that they can't commit to the debt load to buy property. The thing that seems confusing to me are office condos.

Either way it does cost a lot to commute to the city. I would say if you can avoid getting a job in the city, Berkeley, or downtown Oakland it is usually easier in terms of commuting costs, parking and tolls and traffic, or BART and Caltrain fares will be a lot of money, I would say around $200/month, after tax. So if you worked closed to home it would be like earning a good $350/month extra after accounting for taxes, something to think about. I'm not sure how the job market is out in the East Bay though.

Granted if you work in the city you can move a more affordable town like Concord, or live close to BART at Pittsburg, where you can buy a house in the upper 200s, and commute like that.

[mdwstrnkid]

Originally Posted by cardinal2007

I would say major employees do own their properties for financial reasons, small and mid-size businesses, and expanding businesses lease space due to the fact that they can't commit to the debt load to buy property.

Actually I would think the opposite. Owning property would limit the flexibility for a company to contract (or grow) without major financial consequences. Also, I would suspect that many companies would not want to commit to the capital outlay to buy real estate nor would they want to get into the business of property management if it is not their core competency. What do you see as the financial reasons for owning vs leasing?

[Bigwit54]

To give you an idea...
I am 28 years old and moved from Cleveland Oh where I made about 35k in sales and I was doing alright financially, not living paycheck to paycheck at least. I moved here and got a job at a very well known .com and was able to earn 65k a year. I live in Emeryville and things now are much tighter financially than when I was making 35k in Cleveland. I am still trying to figure out how this is possible..
any suggestions would be much appreciated!! ;-)