
De-Location Package: Keep Your Career and Live Beyond the Bay Area - bryanh
https://zapier.com/blog/move-away-from-sf-get-remote-job/
======
bryanh
Zapier CTO & co-founder here.

Much like Stripe's "hire a team" experiment - this is an experiment to pay
people to "de-locate" from the Bay Area. Don't get us wrong, we absolutely
_love_ the Bay Area (I live here) but the cost of living is just outrageous
for so many.

We're seeing a lot of candidates talking to Zapier (we're fully remote) about
leaving the Bay Area to go "home" (some to start a family, some for other
reasons) but want to stay in their tech career.

Happy to answer any questions, and I am sure there are a lot of Zapiens in the
thread that could answer questions too.

~~~
jdavis703
Doesn't this make it easier for you to retain people by restricting their
options in the future? For example if someone moves back to central Missouri,
they're probably not going to find a lot of similar jobs, especially at the
level of pay I'm imaging Zapier provides.

~~~
ryandrake
This would be my primary worry too. When I moved to the Bay Area I took a
massive quality-of-life hit. Went from a place where a big two-story 2000+ sq
ft home cost $100K or so and a 15 minute commute to here, where a mud hut
costs $500K and your commute is 2 hours. But I was willing to do it because
it's less risky employment-wise. If things go bad at one employer here, you're
looking at maybe a 1-3 month job search that you can limit to a 50 mile
radius. If things go bad in Nowheresville, USA, you're looking at a 3-9 month
job search that will likely involve moving out of state.

~~~
jclardy
Your post makes it sound like the only place for tech jobs is the Bay
Area...which I find is not true as an east coast remote.

I mean, yeah if you move to rural South Dakota you won't find much, but there
are plenty of growing tech centers like Raleigh, Boulder, Austin, etc. that
have much lower cost of living, but still a lot of availability in local tech
jobs.

Also to note, the 3-9 month job search should be much more sustainable in
Nowheresville, whereas in SF you are going to be screwed if your job search is
extended.

~~~
eldavido
So, honest question (not trying to troll) - what jobs are available in
Raleigh/Boulder/Austin/etc?

Because where I'm sitting, facebook, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and Apple,
which are 5 of the top 6 most valuable US companies, are HQ'd in the Bay Area
or Seattle. So if you want that caliber of job, with the opportunities and pay
($200-300k+ for mid-level people), you really do have to live in SF/Seattle.

I don't work a BigCo job for other reasons but the reasoning does seem sound.

~~~
shostack
Google is in Boulder. But from what I've heard of the area in general (not
specific to Google), they have Bay Area housing prices with Colorado comp, so
overall you are taking home less and getting less for your money.

~~~
sigstoat
i'm near enough to boulder that google's boulder location would be a <15
minute commute, and <$500k buys you a 2000 sqft house in a quiet neighborhood
and enough of a yard you can't see through your neighbor's window. pretty sure
that's rather drastically cheaper than sf. if you're ok with a 30 minute
commute, you can shave $100k off that. 60 minute commute would shave another
$100k off.

while i'm commenting, i'll note that i don't feel boulder really competes with
NC's research triangle, or austin. boulder county population is 310k, and a
sizable chunk of that is tied up in and around the university and government
research facilities that i feel don't impact local tech industry that much.

~~~
nedwin
Would you mind unpacking "NC research triangle"? North Carolina? Three
research heavy universities?

~~~
closeparen
The Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill combined metro area in North Carolina.

Home to UNC, Duke, and the somewhat famous Research Triangle Park, a suburban
campus containing R&D for Red Hat, IBM, and several big pharmaceutical
companies.

The Palo Alto of the South.

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hapless
It benefits them to have you leave the bay area, because they know it will be
much more difficult for you to find your next job. They are paying $10k now to
minimize future raises and equity grants.

I can think of less risky ways to squeeze $10k out of a new employer.

~~~
zeamaize
I left the Bay Area in 2011 because I was tired of the endless suburban
hellscape, the high cost of housing, and the poor cultural offerings (yeah SFO
is great but that's a long way off).

I was worried it'd be tough to move jobs or careers and that getting new jobs
would be harder.

It hasn't been. I've been steadily moving up and into new positions at new
companies every 2 years just like I was in the Bay Area. My salary is 2.7x
higher than it was when I left the Bay Area, and I now have a 5,000 sqft home
in a great city that I paid about 1/10th as much for as I would have in the
Bay Area.

~~~
FT_intern
> My salary is 2.7x higher

The original salary must have been low, no hate.

Different strokes for different folks. If you're working at a company that
already pays well and you're not in the Bay Area, then your options for
switching are either exciting but very risky startups (< $1 billion) or small
satellite offices of big corps that have limited team options and little
political influence (bad for advancement in senior positions). These would
typically be lateral movements at best.

~~~
zeamaize
> The original salary must have been low, no hate.

My new salary is just much higher, I've had several major steps up. I've found
salaries in major metro areas to be pretty much the same as a competitive
offer in the Bay Area.

> Different strokes for different folks. If you're working at a company that
> already pays well and you're not in the Bay Area, then your options for
> switching are either exciting but very risky startups (< $1 billion) or
> small satellite offices of big corps that have limited team options and
> little political influence (bad for advancement in senior positions). These
> would typically be lateral movements at best.

The Bay Area isn't the only place with a tech sector, and there are plenty of
companies whose main offices aren't in the Bay Area. Washington DC, Chicago,
Austin, Denver, all have tremendous tech industries. I've even had job offers
at great places that are further out there.

My "one that got away" was a job offer in Portland I still think about. It was
a great opportunity and a fantastic city, but I ultimately went elsewhere
primarily based on the desire to bring some of my projects with me.

~~~
hapless
DC, Chicago, Austin, and Denver absolutely have booming tech industries. And
rising costs of living to match.

It should not surprise anyone that wages in other top-tier cities match the
Bay Area.

~~~
zeamaize
I'm now living in a much smaller city, and the salaries here are even higher.

Good tech companies know they have to make nationally competitive offers.

~~~
sdflkd
Which city, if you don't mind me asking?

~~~
zeamaize
Sorry. I try not to give too much info.

You wouldn't guess it if I gave you 20 questions is my bet. When I got the
offer for an interview the wife and I almost passed entirely on the
opportunity (I didn't apply for it they recruited me) because we thought "We
don't want to live there" and I had a solid offer in Seattle and Portland,
where we thought we wanted to move.

I flew out anyway as a courtesy to the VP who reached out to me because we had
a long history and he told me I needed to come see what they had to offer.

Flew my wife out the next day, she was super skeptical "I'm not going to like
it!" (She is also in tech). She fell in love. We bought her dream house a
month later. Still in our honeymoon period with this new city, but we have
never been in love with a city like this before.

~~~
bogomipz
I think its odd that you keeping referring to an abstract "here" as a an
alternative and standard of comparison to the Bay Area but won't say where
that is. This whole discussion is about geography as it relates to career.

~~~
woah
I guess the big thing we've learned from this person's posts is that it is
possible to like a city that is not SF.

~~~
user5994461
And you get better offers when you're poached by a VP you are acquainted with.

It shouldn't take long to confuse your salary in these circumstances with the
salaries of people working for and around you. Your immediate reference is
probably that VP who is also VP :D

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exolymph
I got to interview the team about this decision, so here are more details if
you're curious: [http://www.inc.com/sonya-mann/zapier-remote-work-de-
location...](http://www.inc.com/sonya-mann/zapier-remote-work-de-
location.html)

~~~
throwaway40483
No offense, but how could you avoid addressing the elephant in the room?

"Will my salary be COL adjusted?"

~~~
exolymph
They offer you the job before they know if you're going to move or not, so it
wouldn't make sense for that to affect the salary, unless you mentioned
upfront that you planned to abscond to Iowa or wherever.

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dmode
I am probably in the minority, but I hate remote teams. I have worked with
remote teams in various timezones all my life and it has pretty much destroyed
any semblance of love of work that I had. Calls in the mornings, calls in the
evenings, lack of white boarding capabilities, not able to quickly tap on the
shoulder and ask a question, not able to have team outings or in promptu happy
hours etc. has exhausted me. I am now looking for a job with a 100% local
team.

~~~
user5994461
It's all about the timezone.

You can take 4-5 hour difference top, that leaves you an afternoon to work
together and talk when you need to.

Any link with >8 hour difference is doomed to failure, you can't communicate
at all.

On top of that, you need to all be extremely experienced and autonomous, and
you need to have regular trips to meet in person.

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djb_hackernews
Obvious question, do they get to keep their Bay Area salary?

~~~
zeamaize
I did, in fact I've vastly improved my salary by leaving the Bay Area.

I can tell you my team just hired a bunch of new engineers and we mad offers
10% above Bay Area offers very much on purpose.

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amyjess
I wish more companies did this, not just Bay Area companies.

I'm in Texas and looking to relocate to SoCal (specifically Torrance) in the
second half of this year, and while I'm hoping my employer will let me either
go remote or relocate me to their LA office, I'm terrified that they won't and
I'll have to find a new job (I really like my employer, so I'll only leave if
I absolutely have to).

~~~
sjg007
There are lots of jobs around Torrance in tech.

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pmiller2
Sounds like a neat way for Zapier to take advantage of Bay Area talent without
paying Bay Area salaries. This isn't really for me, because I don't like
remote work and I like living in the Bay Area, but I think this is a brilliant
move. However, I'd want to know what the pay scale was like before making this
kind of move.

~~~
sidlls
If pay were the only factor I'd take a 20%-30% pay cut to be able to move
closer to my wife's family and we as a family would end up being able to save
more while actually owning a huge home.

~~~
pmiller2
Yeah, if cost of were the only factor, I could buy 2 or 3 houses in my home
town for what I pay in rent. :/

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coding123
The Bay Area needs to re-think traffic. Perhaps the hyperloop isn't so much
needed between two already congested cities, but between lots of rural areas
that can feed into congested cities. Live 5 hours (by car) from the BA and get
there by hyperloop in 25 minutes.

~~~
hapless
Cost and congestion are driven by the commuting time to job centers.

If Bakersfield becomes a bedroom community for San Francisco with a 25 minute
commute, you can count on Bakersfield housing prices converging on Bay Area
costs.

This is probably a net win for the community of Bakersfield, but it may not
change things very much for you as a pre-existing worker in San Francisco.

~~~
dragonwriter
Increasing the effective commute radius into the Bay Area such that property
ownership and rental prices were driven up in the new commuter towns would
also reduce the upward pressure on prices in the Bay Area and it's existing
commuter towns.

~~~
hapless
Good point. Convergence of prices is a big win if it means the "center" stops
rising so quickly.

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dsacco
Analyzing this announcement critically, I work through the following:

1\. Why would Zapier publicize a new policy for existing employees? Cynically,
that appears to be a PR opportunity.

2\. The new policy is an "experiment" that pays existing employees $10,000 to
cover relocation costs to move outside the Bay Area.

3\. I assume that the employees' salaries are then adjusted for COL (this is
the crux). This presents an arbitrage between the $10k and salary adjustment.

4\. Zapier is facilitating a process that, in effect, acquires employees from
one location for a cheaper price than competitors, as long as those employees
are willing to move outside of the Bay Area.

I don't have a comment on whether I agree or disagree; I guess it's good to
support employees living where they want to. But I'd be interested in knowing
1) if employees do have their salaries adjusted for cost of living when they
move and 2) where many employees ultimately end up moving to.

There is a face value lens that I can read this announcement through, but
there is another lens related to the price of talent in the Bay Area. If I
don't take this at face value, it's interesting to me if this carries any
signal about real estate or tech salary outlook.

EDIT - Nevermind, salaries aren't adjusted for cost of living.

~~~
jkarneges
I read it as applying to new hires, not necessarily existing employees, so it
makes sense that they'd publicize it.

If it only applies to new hires then that may make salary adjustment easier
(if that's part of this).

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deanclatworthy
What a refreshing idea. I'd love to hear the results after a year of this
experiment.

I think the idea can apply to many cities, even outside the US. Some European
cities are in the midst of a housing (availability) crisis forcing rent prices
up and leaving young families to live in small apartments to be within a
commutable distance to work.

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sudosteph
You should really expand this to Seattle folks as well. I've decided to stay
for now, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't wistfully start looking at the
housing prices in Miami after this awful winter...

~~~
CryoLogic
Also in Seattle - housing prices have exploded to the point where many 100k+
engineers would struggle to get a 30yr mortgage on a 1 bedroom. 400k+ for a
nice 1bd here (within 10 miles), not yet Silicon Valley but still quite bad.

~~~
brutus1213
I don't track the Seattle market closly but several people have mentioned
this. Is this just the city core or all the suburbs too? How much does a 3
bedroom go for? 4 years ago, I heard it could be had for 500K. Has it doubled?

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rajeshp1986
I think this is a great start. More and more companies should start doing
this. That way people will get convinced to take these packages and move to
smaller cities where they can have better life.

It doesn't make sense to cram your family in a 700 sq. ft apartment and still
pay $3500 rent for it. I like other people was very excited about bay area but
after coming here I often wonder whether it is worth it. Also, 30s is where
you start saving more for future. giving that money as rent makes my heart
cry.

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agibsonccc
I'd just like to commend the zapier folks for promoting a remote first company
like this. We're distributed across 6 timezones and have built up like this
for years. I always try to hire engineers where they live. This causes some
complications but it's been worth it for us. We've found you have to have the
right culture for it though. It's harder to "bolt on" remote.

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nedwin
Would love to know how fundraising has been impacted by being a remote first
company. Did you get resistance? Are there certain investors who are
fundamentally for or against?

~~~
bryanh
I think there is a bit of hesitation for some VC's in backing a remote first
company - but some are all for it. Investors aren't as much a hivemind as one
might think - they all have different theses that impact how they interpret
remote first companies.

We did raise some money in the early days (when it was much more faith than
evidence) but I don't recall any concern about our remote intentions from our
investors. Since then - we've reached profitability.

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nunez
Interesting. Does one salary stay the same with this agreement?

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komali2
This is my dream, and this is why I switched industries to become a
programmer. One day, I will achieve the apex - beach cafe in Vietnam, tethered
net connection, happily tapping away code for my full time job.

Someday....

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beatpanda
More like this, please, from everyone. God bless you for doing this.

