

Ask HN: Moving to a city in Europe. Where should I go? - philipDS

I am a MSc. CS and have lived in Madrid for one year. Now I am looking for a new opportunity within Europe and have looked at a few cities that are good startup-wise. You read a lot in the media and it's hard to get some unbiased feedback... so here goes.<p>I would like to move to either Berlin, Barcelona or London, but I have a few questions and I was wondering if there are some people on HN that have lived or currently live in one of these cities (or even better, have lived in two or more). I am currently freelancing/consulting in Ruby on Rails and might continue to do so. Another option is to get a startup job that allows me to learn more about scalability with a company that is seeing heavy growth. Any (general) advice is welcome.<p>1. How does Berlin, London and Barcelona compare ecosystem-wise? We're hearing a lot about Berlin and London lately, but not too much about Barcelona. Is it any good? I know Telefonica has an incubator (Wayra) in BCN, but is there a lot of other activity?<p>2. How much Spanish is required to do well in BCN? I have lived in Madrid for a year, so I can speak some Spanish, but prefer to communicate in English, at least professionally. If I go to meetups in BCN to network (for RoR gigs), will I have to speak Spanish or English? Same question for Berlin and German.<p>3. Rent is probably cheap(er) in Berlin/BCN. I heard it's pretty high in London. What can I expect in London? I would wanna share a flat with flatmates. How does London compare to Birmingham?<p>4. Should I look for a job, I know London and Berlin have a lot of startups and big co's. What about Barcelona? Could I apply for a startup that is seeing heavy growth and allows me to learn to build products on a decent scale?<p>5. Any other suggestions? :)<p>I hope some of you can help me make a decision. Thanks!
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stickydink
3\. Living in Central London is _very_ expensive. But to counter that, there
are excellent transport links. Generally (as you'd expect), rent decreases the
further you get away. So it's a trade-off with how much you want to spend. I
know people who are happy to commute 75 minutes each way to have a decent
place at a reasonable price. What helps that is, you can go 90+ minutes and
you will likely just need to get on one train, and then a quick tube swap when
you're there.

Flat sharing is fairly common, but not as common as it is in the US. Though
you'll find one easily enough. This[1] isn't perhaps entirely up to date, and
won't have some cheaper, private landlords, but has a lot to browse and gives
a good indicator of prices. Anywhere within the M25 (the blue road that
circles London) is going to be a maximum of about 30 minutes public transport
into the centre.

The variation in areas is huge, so I'd suggest looking at prices, and
researching them individually. Personally, I've visited many times but haven't
lived there myself, so can't recommend a particular area. Be wary of the very
inner areas (that aren't extremely expensive), they're probably not what
you're looking for.

[1] <http://www.rightmove.co.uk/draw-a-search.html>

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mootothemax
Also consider what's more important to you: six months in a country that has a
great startup culture, or six months in a dirt-cheap country where cost of
living is so low, you can spend more time working on your startup without
worrying about the bills.

I will sing Poland's praises until the end of time, but it has all modern
conveniences and is incredibly cheap to live in, even in the capital city
Warsaw. (If you fancy somewhere a bit prettier, Kraków is even cheaper).

If you just need a bit of time to find you feet and get set up, I'd consider
spending a few months here - the summers are glorious! - and then move to
somewhere a bit more startup-y.

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Peroni
I work in London so I'll chip in.

As others have said, rent is extremely expensive in the City however transport
links are outstanding. I live just outside of London and pay significantly
less rent than most of my colleagues who live in the City and yet it still
only takes me 45 minutes to get to work, door to door.

The start-up scene in London is arguably the strongest in Europe and there are
tons of meet-ups and events to help you network. The jobs scene is equally
vibrant. Rails is in huge demand with both start-ups and established companies
so you'll have no issue finding work.

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bernatfp
Hi, BCN guy, intern @ Telefonica R&D.

To go around BCN you should have at least a basic Spanish/Catalan level.

From what I've heard, most technical meetups are usually done in English.

Startups: Tuenti, Yuilop, Socialpoint, Teambox, 3scale, Itnig... Many others
here <https://angel.co/barcelona>

If you want to focus exclusively on startup jobs, I think that
<http://www.jobfluent.com> is probably the best site to look at.

Referring to incubators, there are some but I don't know if English is spoken
there. I can tell you that at Telefonica everybody can speak English because
there is people from around the globe working in there (at least in R&D) so I
assume the same for Wayra. By the way, other accelerators/incubators/coworking
spaces: Seedrocket, Barcelona Activa, La Salle Technova, Palo Alto BCN, MOB
Barcelona...

Last recommendation: To know what is going on within the city, follow
@startupbcn and subscribe to the BCN Startup Digest mailing list. This should
be a good start for newcomers.

Overall: I think that the BCN startup community isn't as big as in London or
Berlin, but this is changing fast. The other problem I see is that still lots
of entrepreneurship events are held in Catalan/Spanish, and I think it
discourages foreigners to get into the ecosystem. I hope this will change
soon...

Anyway, I always say that I would choose BCN because it is the other SV (Sunny
Valley) ;)

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philipDS
Thanks for the links buddy! I will check out the startups you mentioned and
the job board looks interesting as well. Vamos a ver :)

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ig1
I've lived and worked in the startup scene in London for a few years, and I've
lived in Berlin for three months too.

Language-wise: You can get by with English fine in Berlin (not true in the
rest of Germany though), English is pretty common in the startup world. Even
generally English is pretty widely understood by younger (i.e <35) Berliners
although fewer of them speak it fluently.

London has by far the biggest ecosystem, Berlin has a decent one although much
more early stage. Barcelona is tiny, see this infographic:

<http://seedtable.com/blog/images/startuphubs2012.png>

Rent is much more expensive in London than in Berlin, but on the other hand
salaries are also higher in London. As a ruby consultant or working for a
growing funded startup you won't struggle financially. Sharing a nice flat
with 1-2 other people you can expect to pay £600-£1000/month, it should be
comfortably affordable even on a junior ruby dev salary (~30k/year).

With London you'd have a much wider range of startups to choose from, but with
Berlin you'd have a much more laid-back culture and lifestyle. Based on your
criteria I wouldn't choose Barcelona based on the lack of ecosystem and very
limited number of companies who deal with serious scaling.

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meerita
I live in Barcelona since, 2001. I love this city, I'd rather die than moving
from it.

work: you can work in Barcelona in english if you want. Comparing it with the
rest of the country, Barcelona it's way more bilingual than the rest. You can
live well with spanish anyways. But in the tech industry english is really
awesome. Side by side with Madrid, Barcelona it's another big technological
hub. I would really love to connect with anyone from HN to start projects (I
have a couple in queue).

lifestyle: Barcelona is relaxed. It's organized compared with Madrid. You have
the beach near any point without making an hour in bicycle. Food is not
expensive, prices are affordable.

rent: since 2001, Barcelona was the 5th most expensive city to live in, but
now, with the crisis, things changed a lot: I have a nice, new flat for
625€/mo. Fully equiped, not so centric located, but at 10min in train, 15 min
in metro from the center of the city and 7 mins from the beach, so its a big
deal.

~~~
philipDS
Meerita, could you contact me (email address is in my profile)? I'd love to
talk more about a possible collaboration.

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muxxa
I live in Dublin and think it has a reasonable enough startup scene with
PubStandards meetups and the possibility of free desk space:
<http://dogpatchlabs.com/about/>

An acquaintance has experience of both Dublin & Vienna and thinks that the
latter has the best startup environment in Europe.

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nigekelly
Alot of people here are saying you can get cheap rent in London if you're
willing to travel in from the suburbs. Yes this is true. But it is also true
that transport can be very expensive. You can easily spend £20-£30 for a
return train ticket which would cost you £400 to £600 per month in travel
costs. So be careful about choosing where you live. At that rate it may be
better to live at walking distance to office.

My advice is to live South of the Thames (generally cheaper) and then commute
in at about £10-£15 per day. Still £200 to £300 per month. It's quick too.

LOndon is awful for cycling also. I hear Berlin is very cycle friendly. So you
could save alot in Berlin on rent and transport.

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ayers
I live in London and cycle to work every day. I work in Victoria, live south
of the Thames and it takes me about 25 minutes each way, which is great.

Cycling is not for the faint hearted but I would not say it was awful. London
is not set-up for cyclist like a lot of other European countries (Netherlands,
Denmark etc). I personally love it and would do it over taking a packed tube
any day.

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CookWithMe
I live in Berlin. A good friend of mine lived in London for a while and I
visited him a couple of times.

Rent in London is a lot more expensive than in Berlin, and food etc is more
expensive as well. Salaries are higher in London, though. Flat sharing is
common in Berlin, but my friend had no big trouble finding flat sharing in
London.

Speaking English is no problem in Berlin... many internationals live and work
here.

Don't know anything about Barcelona, but I suspect the weather there is a lot
better than in either London or Berlin :)

I suggest you spent a week in each city, attend some meetups etc and decide
based on which culture you like better.

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philipDS
Very good idea about spending a week in each city. Considering that, thanks!
:)

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DividesByZero
I moved to Berlin with my cofounder three months ago and could not be happier.
Berlin is more about the early-stage startup but there are a few at the
bigger/exit stage as well.

This city is hungry for Rails developers so you should not have too much of a
problem finding work, whether freelance or for a team.

Berlin is cheap to live in, costs are about half of what they are in London
from what I understand. The city is very much alive in a lot of ways, and the
start-up community is tight knit but accepting and diverse.

I speak English with only rudimentary German and have yet to run into any
serious problems in the startup scene, or even basics like renting a flat.

If you are visiting within the next couple of months let me know, I might be
able to introduce you to some teams who are hiring and give you an overview in
general.

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philipDS
Awesome. I will contact you for sure! Can you send me an email or provide your
email address? :) (mine is in my profile)

~~~
DividesByZero
Sent you a mail

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taigeair
I've lived and worked in Berlin and London. Originally from North America.

I'd recommend going to London if you want to be more career driven and if you
want a higher quality of life, go to Berlin. London has a lot of people which
can help you grow your career but also more competitive. Berlin is more chill.

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brutuscat
BCNonRails (<http://barcelonaonrails.com/>) monthly meetings are in English
and I can tell that there are plenty of non-spanish-speakers people living in
the city which do just fine!

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philipDS
Excellent link! Will definitely help. Good to know that the meetings are in
English, thanks :)

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jray
Barcelona is really fun, you can enjoy the mediterranean culture !

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VRZlSSIrwY>

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hhKpOz4SROE>

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Je2GLJ6ogmU>

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azpxHbUyuOw>

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onlyup
Never heard anyone say "I am a MSc. CS" before!

