Is There a Tech Worker 'Exodus' From the San Francisco Bay Area?

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erek

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"'You start to feel stupid': Tech workers can't leave SF fast enough"

"The Times also notes "there is a very vocal Miami faction, led by a few venture capital influencers, trying to tweet the city's startup world into existence," as other cities begin to realize that "the talent and money of newly remote tech workers are up for grabs."Topeka, Kansas, started Choose Topeka, which will reimburse new workers $10,000 for the first year of rent or $15,000 if they buy a home. Tulsa, Oklahoma, will pay you $10,000 to move there. The nation of Estonia has a new residency program just for digital nomads. A program in Savannah, Georgia, will reimburse remote workers $2,000 for the move there, and the city has created various social activities to introduce the newcomers to one another and to locals...
But the article also points out that "More money was made faster in the Bay Area by fewer people than at any other time in American history," and speculates on what long-time residents may be thinking:people who distrusted the young newcomers from the start will say this change is a good thing. Hasn't this steep growth in wealth and population in a tiny geography always seemed unsustainable? These tech workers came like a whirlwind. Virtually every community from San Jose in the south to Marin County in the north has fought the rise of new housing for the arrivals of the last decade. Maybe spreading the tech talent around America is smart.

Locals have also seen this play before. Moving trucks come to take a generation of tech ambition away, and a few years later moving trucks return with new dreamers and new ambitions."

https://it.slashdot.org/story/21/01...worker-exodus-from-the-san-francisco-bay-area
 
There's always lots of people leaving California, but there's usually more moving to California.

I left the Bay Area because if you don't need to work at a tech company, there's better places to be (everyone has their own reasons). My wife has goats and chickens now, which wasn't going to happen on a lot measured in square feet rather than acres; there were some chickens in our old neighborhood, but no goats.
 
California tech companies are having a hard time recruiting and keeping talent. It’s hard to convince fresh university graduates that they are going to need to spend 3-5 hours a day commuting, or live in their car for a year while they save up for a down payment for their rent. Especially when they have better options elsewhere, Tech companies in California may pay more but after dealing with long commutes, or insane rent fresh hires are making compatibly less. So Texas other states which have both infrastructure, and available housing are very attractive locations for these places to migrate too.
 
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Can attest to the California influx I’ve been here in Austin since 2010 and its getting increasing crazy in the housing/renting market the last 5 years. The availability has been dwindling the past 12 months especially with covid/post covid vaccination tech influxes not limited to Tesla, Facebook, and Amazon being the big contenders.

I can’t tell if this a permanent increase or a bubble thats going to pop, but brand new builds on the north side of town in hutto/pflugerville are sold at least 6 months before they’re done building and often before they even break ground.

I was lucky enough to buy in 2014, we sold last June for 50% more than we bought which was mind boggling to us and we still can’t quite wrap our heads around (we were under contract for closure within 48 hours, and thats often the norm). We bought our current house in May 2020 (still Austin/Pville area) which has since already appreciated almost 10% we managed to buy big enough its gonna be suitable until the kids are outta school.

On the inverse my renting coworkers have not been fairing well, they either have to pay 1500-2000 to live near downtown or still 1100-1500 in the outer areas. My 2010 rent for a 950sq ft 2/2 apt near downtown was 865$ which we thought was high. It basically escalated from there as we moved apartments to each year jumping to keep from having to pay a $200 price increase, but still went up 75-100$ each time for the same size. That same size apt was up to $1200/mo in 2014 when we finally replaced it with a mortgage which was only $1250 in comparison for twice the square footage.
 
Can attest to the California influx I’ve been here in Austin since 2010 and its getting increasing crazy in the housing/renting market the last 5 years. The availability has been dwindling the past 12 months especially with covid/post covid vaccination tech influxes not limited to Tesla, Facebook, and Amazon being the big contenders.

I can’t tell if this a permanent increase or a bubble thats going to pop, but brand new builds on the north side of town in hutto/pflugerville are sold at least 6 months before they’re done building and often before they even break ground.

I was lucky enough to buy in 2014, we sold last June for 50% more than we bought which was mind boggling to us and we still can’t quite wrap our heads around (we were under contract for closure within 48 hours, and thats often the norm). We bought our current house in May 2020 (still Austin/Pville area) which has since already appreciated almost 10% we managed to buy big enough its gonna be suitable until the kids are outta school.

On the inverse my renting coworkers have not been fairing well, they either have to pay 1500-2000 to live near downtown or still 1100-1500 in the outer areas. My 2010 rent for a 950sq ft 2/2 apt near downtown was 865$ which we thought was high. It basically escalated from there as we moved apartments to each year jumping to keep from having to pay a $200 price increase, but still went up 75-100$ each time for the same size. That same size apt was up to $1200/mo in 2014 when we finally replaced it with a mortgage which was only $1250 in comparison for twice the square footage.
Truth! SF does appear to be all coming to Austin. I have one in the Northwest and one down south near Manchaca (not Menchaca) purchased in 2014 and 2015, that have appreciated 70% and 50% respectively.

I don’t think we’re in a bubble in the normal sense because there’s enough money coming into town to maintain it, but I do think prices will level a bit after the current scarcity corrects by people cashing out. At the end of the day the California inxodus is great if you’re already bought into the market and terrible if you’re not. This market has priced out six figure new buyers in a lot of areas already.
 
this is not news ... it's old news, been going on for a while now. Big influx from CA here in NM the past year
 
People seem to forget that California is more than SF (and LA). I used to live in Santa Monica (part of Silicon Beach), where $1 million was (and still is) good for a middle floor 2 bedroom condo. During this pandemic I moved my small family to a new master planned community in South Orange County since my wife and I both work remotely. Where is that? Oh yeah, still California. That same million was good for a new 4BR home where the HOA actually pays for good amenities, and is still within 15-20 minutes of the beach. We are also one hour exactly from LA and San Diego. Sure I could have moved us to Idaho or another midwestern state and even considered retiring early there considered we could have just flat out bought a home for the half price we paid here, but we just had 4 75-80F days in a row in January and went to the neighborhood pools and local beaches for all 4. There's no other state maybe aside Hawaii that offers year-round outdoorsy weather and that's worth the tax to me.

Now fires... if those are really problematic year-after-year then we may look to relocate to another state. Even if the fires aren't near us, we still end up poor air quality. Last year was particularly bad. It's not something I want to deal with year-after-year so if something does have us relocate it's not going to be the cost, but climate change.
 
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how bad is it?
Based on the size of the companies moving, bare minimum 30K, possibly double that.

Edit:
Texas Realtors Association says that between 2018 and 2020 nearly 300,000 people have moved from California to Texas. More than 70% of those claiming the cost of housing being the deciding factor.
 
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Well not sure if it is a lot of tech companies but of those who have told workers that working remotely is ok but they wouldn't get the bay area increase in pay
 
People seem to forget that California is more than SF (and LA). I used to live in Santa Monica (part of Silicon Beach), where $1 million was (and still is) good for a middle floor 2 bedroom condo. During this pandemic I moved my small family to a new master planned community in South Orange County since my wife and I both work remotely. Where is that? Oh yeah, still California. That same million was good for a new 4BR home where the HOA actually pays for good amenities, and is still within 15-20 minutes of the beach. We are also one hour exactly from LA and San Diego. Sure I could have moved us to Idaho or another midwestern state and even considered retiring early there considered we could have just flat out bought a home for the half price we paid here, but we just had 4 75-80F days in a row in January and went to the neighborhood pools and local beaches for all 4. There's no other state maybe aside Hawaii that offers year-round outdoorsy weather and that's worth the tax to me.

Now fires... if those are really problematic year-after-year then we may look to relocate to another state. Even if the fires aren't near us, we still end up poor air quality. Last year was particularly bad. It's not something I want to deal with year-after-year so if something does have us relocate it's not going to be the cost, but climate change.
Maybe an hour to LA when it's clear. I live in OC north of you and whenever I've needed to get to LA at business times it takes me 2-3 hours depending on where I'm going
 
People seem to forget that California is more than SF (and LA). I used to live in Santa Monica (part of Silicon Beach), where $1 million was (and still is) good for a middle floor 2 bedroom condo. During this pandemic I moved my small family to a new master planned community in South Orange County since my wife and I both work remotely. Where is that? Oh yeah, still California. That same million was good for a new 4BR home where the HOA actually pays for good amenities, and is still within 15-20 minutes of the beach. We are also one hour exactly from LA and San Diego. Sure I could have moved us to Idaho or another midwestern state and even considered retiring early there considered we could have just flat out bought a home for the half price we paid here, but we just had 4 75-80F days in a row in January and went to the neighborhood pools and local beaches for all 4. There's no other state maybe aside Hawaii that offers year-round outdoorsy weather and that's worth the tax to me.

Now fires... if those are really problematic year-after-year then we may look to relocate to another state. Even if the fires aren't near us, we still end up poor air quality. Last year was particularly bad. It's not something I want to deal with year-after-year so if something does have us relocate it's not going to be the cost, but climate change.
Weather is nice but not the be all.

As someone who has lived in Northern California my whole life, I am ready to move. In fact, if my company gave me the green light to move outside the state, we would be gone in a sec. High taxes, cost of living, traffic, crime, homeless, liberals, overzealous government, over reaching gun laws and one one of the worst school systems in the country are a few issues I have with this crappy state.

You can keep it all. If/when all the hardworking middle class and businesses move out what are you going to have? Nothing.
 
From what I've heard about SF etc, the rent and house prices are just insane.
Kinda not sure why people would stay there. I know the jobs might pay well, but you are paying huge costs out just to live there. Surely that negates any of the good.
 
Most major cities saw an "exodus" in 2020.

Living in a condo under lock down would be a special kind of hell.

I like my life here on Cruiser Lake, fuck crowds.
 
I'm not sure where in NorCal you live that it has one the worst school systems in the country as I assumed the Bay Area was pretty well regarded there. But for the other points, I left Santa Monica a lot of those reasons. Its issues parallel heavily with the Bay Area. But a little bit over an hour south of there we don't have the traffic, crime, homeless, liberals, and the overzealous government feels like background noise. And the schools are some of the best in the country. Our move was a night and day difference in our day-to-day lives. It almost feels like we moved away from the the new world of the pandemic back in the old world of the old normal. What really happened was urban living died and suburban living became a much needed escape. Things are obviously still impacted here due to the pandemic, but its far better off than what was going on in Santa Monica where most of Wilshire Blvd was/(is?) boarded up. LA was pretty much a third world city before the pandemic, and now even the west side looks like one as well.

I guess if we couldn't afford to move to South OC or North County San Diego, we may have packed up and left too. But point being: California is a huge state and there are plenty of nice areas detached from most of those issues that are opening up to remote tech employees such as myself. Texas is not even nor ever was on my radar. Plus in a decade it'll have all of California's problems with all those Californians moving there. :wacky:
 
Those companies seem to be doing okay.

I think now with WFH it doesn't make sense to live where the rent is obscenely expensive.
 
Living in California, I don't see people moving out of California as a problem, for what ever reason. There's been so many people moving here over the decades, there was always going to be a breaking point.

If living in California is untenable, by all means, find a better place to live your life for your own sanity.
 
I was brought up as a teenager in San Francisco (1969-1976) and I visit it on occasion... but you couldn't pay me to live there anymore. The once most beautiful city possibly in the world has been ruined by hordes of drug addicts, homeless and career criminals who know that the city Board of Supervisors will do everything in their power to assist and enable them in their chosen lifestyle - all at the expense of their tax payers. If a bad policy fails, then double-down on it... and again, and again :/
/it was bad already in the mid-1980's and functionally unlivable already by the early 2000's
 
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From what I've heard about SF etc, the rent and house prices are just insane.
Kinda not sure why people would stay there. I know the jobs might pay well, but you are paying huge costs out just to live there. Surely that negates any of the good.
All you really have to do is walk around on a nice day and you'll understand part of why.

It's a beautiful area with moderate weather all year round. If it weren't for the pandemic, I'd love to visit. That's not even including the eclectic culture.

The problem, of course, is that staying there is absurdly expensive and might not be worthwhile if you're unattached to the climate or nearby family. Certainly not in a pandemic when you may be stuck at home.
 
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