

Living near Si Valley but with lower living expenses? - gregwebs

I have been thinking about trying to locate to Sacremento in the hopes of being close to Silicon Valley but being able to afford to live.  Are there good startup opportunities in places like these?
======
portLAN
The Fresno Bee had an article about this recently, suggesting Clovis:
<http://www.fresnobee.com/263/story/99048.html>

It gets a little hot, and it's about 3 hours from Silicon Valley.

If you just want to live in a cool place that's startup-friendly, Portland
rocks. It's also much less expensive.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon_Forest>

Open Source Development Labs/The Linux Foundation is here, too, and so is
Linus.

There's free wireless all over the place, and Portland was the "Most Unwired
City in America" in 2003.

<http://map.personaltelco.net/>

Oh yeah, and there's no sales tax. A lot of people move just over the border
to Vancouver, Washington (which has no state income tax) and shop in Portland.

------
donna
You may want to consider finding a location near public transportation; e.g.
Pittburg near the BART. That way you can live outside SF affordably but BART
into events; <http://bart.gov/stations/map/systemMap.asp>

------
myoung8
Sacramento is _relatively_ close, but if you really want to be involved in the
startup community, San Francisco is a much better choice.

Sacramento is far enough away to make you think twice about attending all the
cool events that happen in San Francisco and Palo Alto and Mountain View.

------
pg
There are a lot of neighborhoods in the Bay Area. They are not all expensive.

~~~
menloparkbum
The only one I can think of is Oakland, and the parts of Oakland that are not
expensive are not places I'd recommend to a Bay Area newbie. If you can think
of others, please list them, and I'll politely let you know why you wouldn't
want to live there.

~~~
staunch
This is exactly what I've seen so far. I've lived in enough "bad areas" in my
life that my quota is all used up. I want to live somewhere relatively safe. I
also want to keep my "personal burn rate" low. Oakland is totally out. I'm not
sure anywhere in the city qualifies. My current plan is to either commute a
long way or give in and pay a lot in rent.

Anyone have suggestions of safe areas that aren't overly expensive or too far
away?

~~~
comatose_kid
Santa Clara is relatively cheap, safe and pretty central. Take a look at

<http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sby/roo/401753275.html>

for example (800/mo for a 2bd/1ba). But there's no 'atmosphere' compared to
Palo Alto, or Berkeley.

