Ask HN: Relocating from Europe to Silicon Valley

[relocatr]

Hi,

Discalimer: I'm using a throwaway account to post this.

lt;dr: After paying tax and rent, how viable is living on $4800/mo (in total, for two people) in Silicon Valley?

I have recently been offered by the company I work for to relocate to our Silicon Valley office to lead a growing engineering team. I currently live in Europe, and I'm trying to get to grips with the standard of living I could expect.

I have a spouse who would relocate with me, but not get a working visa. This means I would have to support her fully.

The offer I received was for $90K + $2K/mo housing aid. We are planning to rent a 2 bedroom place in the valley, and we would also need to get a car.

Now, even after doing some research I am having trouble figuring out what kind of standard of living we would get out of my salary. Seems ~1/3 of the pay would leap into the pockets of Uncle Sam and the state of CA, so given that we rent a place for $2200/mo that would leave around $4800 to cover food, utilities, car, gas, insurance, phone, cable and all other expenses. This would also need to cover some savings to counter the fact that working in the US for a period of time will effectively halt our pension savings in Europe for that time.

So, my question is: What kind of standard of living does this get us?

[davidandgoliath]

Dig around on padmapper.com (craigslist mash-up) to see at least what housing would cost. Can't add much else as I'm not in the area, but I do know that food is significantly less expensive than vs. Europe -- esp. in California (I'm in Southern California, myself).

It would be difficult to gauge standard of living / quality of living without having some semblance of an idea of what you define as your standards. I've cut my costs since moving to California. Eating in more often, driving less and watching budgets closely mitigates what would have been a slightly higher cost of living. Quality of life on the other hand is far higher as a result of wonderful weather & more time outside with my family :)

Apples & oranges though, so, it depends what you're in pursuit of.

(Perspective. I pay $1,800 p/mo for a 4br with a big beautiful backyard & lots of hummingbirds, utilities around $200 for internet, power, water, gas & $150 p/mo for our cell phones. $40 a month for car insurance, paid off '02 corolla. Plates/registration for the vehicle were $175 or thereabouts. $2,200 odd a month + the odd 1-2 nights out a month. We pay about $40 a week in groceries to feed three, though often splurge on some good steak. Not including taxes, federal/state.)

[relocatr → davidandgoliath]

Thanks for responding!

Well, I suppose what I'm looking for is:

1) Will we be able to spend money on some sort of hobby for my spouse? 2) What kind of car insurance rates are we looking at as new immigrants (also young and relatively inexperienced drivers)? 3) What kind of vacations could we be looking given the income and living expenses? 4) Will we be able to have nights out, go to a sporting event every once in a while etc?

Basically, will a $90K salary for a household of two in SV/San Jose force us to carefully set up a budget, or will we be able to not worry too much about money?

Also, you mention that you're in a 4 br house with a garden for $1800. This sounds amazingly cheap to me, at least from what I've seen looking for housing online. How does one find a deal like that?

Again, thanks!

[davidandgoliath → relocatr]

1) Will we be able to spend money on some sort of hobby for my spouse? I can't imagine why not.

2) What kind of car insurance rates are we looking at as new immigrants (also young and relatively inexperienced drivers)?

Probably similar to ours. My wife's driving history isn't pristine, and she pays <$1k per annum for car insurance. Maintenance is simple enough in California as it's warm enough, too. Though we are married now so the price should come down even further.

3) What kind of vacations could we be looking given the income and living expenses?

That's a loaded question -- apples to oranges and such. My version of a vacation is a road trip somewhere with the wife (e.g. grand canyon) and most of those can be had for a car rental & $500-1,000.

Travel is relatively inexpensive in the U.S. -- you can often fly somewhere for $100 anywhere in the continental U.S. as long as you book properly in advance. Better yet, Hawaii & Puerto Rico are accessible, and as long as your visa is alright so is most of Central America / South America at reasonable prices.

Even local doesn't hurt either, I'm preferential to road trips myself and there's the great state of California to explore -- and Oregon / Washington not too far.

4) Will we be able to have nights out, go to a sporting event every once in a while etc?

Can't see any reason why not. Even a night out once a week wouldn't be difficult to have, esp. in light of them offering you $2k in housing assistance.

>> Basically, will a $90K salary for a household of two in SV/San Jose force us to carefully set up a budget, or will we be able to not worry too much about money? I think money is worth auditing / following closely all of the time.

You won't need to be counting every penny, but attach something like xero to your bank account just to keep an eye on it. It never hurts to use Chirag's online script to keep things under your finger: https://zetabee.com/cashflow/

>> Also, you mention that you're in a 4 br house with a garden for $1800. This sounds amazingly cheap to me, at least from what I've seen looking for housing online. How does one find a deal like that?

You don't in Northern California from what I hear. Housing is going to be your largest burden, but luckily that doesn't fluctuate as long as you're renting.

All in all: Truth is so far from what we've experienced (admittedly, we're frugal, cook at home often, and when we do eat out it's banh mi or burritos) on $4k-6k a month is that there's really no surprises that can't be dealt with even on a monthly basis.

http://www.bestplaces.net/col/ is a good little cost of living calculator that allows you to compare areas / geographical regions. Also, might not hurt to pester @jordansissel who I know lives in the area & seems frugal enough -- also probably has a good idea of local medical costs, housing, etc.