Sunnyvale Job Possibility: Where to Live w/family? Cost? (San Jose: apartment, rental)

[BUCD]

I may have a job offer in Sunnyvale. Where would one (with a family of 4 + 2 elderly parents) stay that's within 45 minutes to an hour max for commutes and good public schools?

Would need a 4-bedroom, and prefer to do a mortgage vs. rent. And would prefer a single family home vs. a condo. What would be a decent/comfortable salary to make it worth it?

Thanks in advance.

[capoeira]

Originally Posted by BUCD

Would need a 4-bedroom, and prefer to do a mortgage vs. rent. And would prefer a single family home vs. a condo. What would be a decent/comfortable salary to make it worth it?

I estimate it might be worth it for a salary around $380k.

A minimum nice house with an easy commute is about 2 million dollars. Here is an example house.

If one puts $500K down on this house they could get a mortgage of 1.7M. That would give an estimated monthly payment of about $10,500 per month. This is for a 30 year loan at 4.1%, property taxes at 1.25% percent of the purchase price and $1,000 annual insurance.

To keep your housing expenses at 1/3 of your salary one would need 3 x $10,500 or 31,500/month or $378,000 per year.

For 1.7M you could also get a small 4 bedroom with a small kitchen. Probably not worth moving cross country for.

The cheapest best option with excellent schools would be to commute from the Fremont, Pleasanton or Dublin area. A million still does not buy much there as one can see in these example houses in Pleasanton and Fremont.


One can also get a new apartment like condo for just under a million in Fremont or Dublin.


The above examples would be about an hour commute from Pleasanton or Dublin in heavy traffic. On rainy days or if there is an accident it might take longer. Fremont would have a shorter commute. It would also be shorter if one can arrange to commute at non-rush hour times.

If you get lucky with your stock option package you might find a house with very excellent schools for under 4M in Palo Alto.

[Ruth4Truth]

OP, the elderly parents must have income. would they be contributing to household expenses? You'll need all hands on deck, to be able to accommodate two additional people with your nuclear family.


5 beds, in Fremont, for $1,088,000
https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...-09284?view=qv

4/2 in Fremont, for $1,199,000.
https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...-67622?view=qv

[marcopolo666]

This is one of the most asked questions. Just skim the previous 6-8 pages of topics and the titles ("moving to area - what to do!??!") will jump out at you.

[Ruth4Truth]

Originally Posted by marcopolo666

This is one of the most asked questions. Just skim the previous 6-8 pages of topics and the titles ("moving to area - what to do!??!") will jump out at you.

OP's situation is a little different, in that he has a family of 6 to accommodate.

[marcopolo666]

The same cities will have the same rental (or mortgage) prices whether one is a family of 3 or 6 (except for needing more bedrooms). And affordable cities are affordable cities, pretty much independent of the size of the house. The commute and the public schools aren't going to change because there are 6 people instead of 4.

Try zillow.com, after reading through the answers already provided on all the other "hey, I'm thinking of moving to the silicon valley" threads that are already here.

[silverkris]

Originally Posted by BUCD

I may have a job offer in Sunnyvale. Where would one (with a family of 4 + 2 elderly parents) stay that's within 45 minutes to an hour max for commutes and good public schools?

Would need a 4-bedroom, and prefer to do a mortgage vs. rent. And would prefer a single family home vs. a condo. What would be a decent/comfortable salary to make it worth it?

Thanks in advance.

Again, first question: What's your budget? That's really important.

[BUCD]

Thank you all very much, especially @capoeira. The housing costs for areas near Sunnyvale are definitely intimidating. I'm currently in north NJ and thought our prices were too high, until I checked out the Bay Area.

Re: budget, I don't know, which is why I'm asking so I know what a decent offer is, and what to negotiate for. I make in the low 200's in northern NJ. Elderly parents won't be contributing financially.

[buenos]

Commute from Fremont or South San Jose. There a 4bed house is $1M and looks like a dump. Most houses look like a dump in the bay area. The exact quality housing and neighborhood in other parts of the country would be $80...150k, that are low end areas typically. If you leave from home at 10AM and from work at 7PM, then your commute will be 35-40 minutes. If you do normal commute times (9AM, 5PM) then double that in stop and go bumper to bumper all the way.
The second post gave you numbers (monthly cost and income) for a $2M house, so half that for a $1M house.
Is it worth it to move here? Think about that.

[BRinSM]

I wouldn’t buy right away. Rent here compared to mortgages almost seems affordable. The rent I pay on my home is roughly half of what I would pay if I were to buy the house at market prices. My rent may be slightly under market, but not by too much. I own a property elsewhere, but may likely never own a home in the Bay Area.

Pay here at the big companies is very good, but everyone makes good money. Where you’ll be able to really start making money is vesting RSUs. After accumulating company stock for a few years you’ll be in a much better position to buy a home.