Living in SF

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Deja

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hey guys, I have a few questions about san francisco

How much do pharmacists make over there (retail wise)?
is the communte really bad from sf to berkeley? and how much would you have to pay for apt if you want live in a nice place near the night life? :)

thanks for the help!

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120-150k. sf to berkeley on bart is roughly 30 mins. if driving it all depends on traffic. with no traffic you can get to berkeley in 20min. with traffic it can take 30-60min. 1500-2500K for decent 1 bedroom apt.
 
I would say 1600 for a small studio in the Sunset (coldest area of the city) MIGHT be possible..I think if you live "near the nightlife", 2500 sounds about right.
 
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2500 for 1bd in a nice place near nightlife....Seems low to me, at that price I would expect a tiny apt with no laundry facilities in the unit and maybe not even in the building and obviously no parking. You will be putting >50% of your take home salary toward rent/utilities if you live in San Fran. It is a fun city but comes at a price.
 
Yeah good luck finding $1600 or even $2500/mo in some place other than the tenderloin or excelsior (maybe), or inner/outer sunset.

I'll write more later, but if you want night life you're gonna pay dearly.
 
SF-Infographic-thumb-2100x1500-777840.png


Mind you this was Feb 2013-ish so add about 5-7% to these numbers today.
 
sfneighborhoods_da8-1.jpg


Updated to June 2014, different site so different data (notice the weird pricing of HP/Bayview)
 
Inner sunset isn't bad, but I prefer outer sunset. If you're living off Geary Blvd. in the Richmond, it's very convenient for public transit (but then again, almost the entire city is good). I had a 2 bedroom apt with 2 parking spots (technically 4 because I could stack a car behind each spot) for $1.6k back in '09-ish. SF to Berkeley is not bad, just hop on the BART. You can also bring your bicycle...
 
If I were to move today, in terms of social life (and avoiding the ghetto) plus access to good food, I'd look in the following areas in this order: SOMA -> Mission -> Dogpatch -> Noe Valley -> Pac Heights -> NoPa/Western Addition.

But note I really don't like Marina people and I'm kind of a closet techie so this makes sense...your preferences will determine your wish list.

I didn't put sunset or outer Richmond because I do enjoy seeing the sun from time to time.

As for the commute to Berkeley..why not find a place to live in one of the gentrified areas of Oakland? You're competing with tech in SF...and most people who do, lose.

Remember, people show up to rental open houses over bidding 1yr of prepaid rent and deposit in cash. Not so much now but it still happens.
 
wow really good responses guys thanks! so 1 bedroom is obiviously out of the question lol I don't want to live in oakland b/c I would have to drive to work and drive to sf to go out, I want to either live near where I work or near the nightlife... but looking at these prices i might have to consider oakland or negotiate a higher pay hahaha
 
i've lived in the sunset for 3 years saving up for a home and it's not bad at all. i was paying 1400 for a 2 bedroom/1bath in law in the garage. public transportation is super easy to use to get to the nightlife places downtown and you can always use uber to get you around the city. the N-judah muni will get you downtown in less than 30 mins. irving street and the inner sunset area is filled with tons of restaurants and supermarkets. the one other thing is that the sunset and inner richmond areas are predominately asian. if you dont mind asians and the foggy weather the sunset is a great reasonably cheap place to live.
 
i was paying 1400 for a 2 bedroom/1bath in law in the garage.

No wonder! It was probably an unlicensed/unregistered/under the table arrangement, I was wondering where you got that $1400 figure from. Please confirm.

Not that I have anything against in-law garage conversions that may or may not be legal (I think they're great), but I was more curious than anything. Legit/above the table units are considerably more, even after considering this was 2009.

But I agree, the N-Judah is life...you can take that thing all the way to the ball park and back. However, with the transfer to BART included, a trip to the east bay would probably take closer to 50 mins to an hour, assuming the OP's place of work is right near one of the two Berkeley BART stations.
 
This is crazy... 1 BR apartment for 2k-3k! I heard CA, NY, DC were expensive, but I have never thought they were that bad... My gosh!
 
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LOL I'll just keep enjoying my 3500 sqft house for just over 1k/month with tax/ins. I have to say that one of the best benefits of being a pharmacist is that you can have a high paying job in a very cheap area.
 
LOL I'll just keep enjoying my 3500 sqft house for just over 1k/month with tax/ins. I have to say that one of the best benefits of being a pharmacist is that you can have a high paying job in a very cheap area.

Lol $1k/mo is like my friend's HOA fees alone.
 
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im not in SF, but in a very desirable place in socal. here a one bedroom is about 1700-1900. yeah i know i can live in a 4000sq house somewhere else in the country, but im going hiking by the beach tomorrow morning, yea its only a 3-mile drive from my apartment. you can't do that anywhere else.
 
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Wow 1k/month hoa??? holy hell does it come with room service from a private butler? Btw, you can keep your beach, I'll gladly take my mountain lake that is about 10 miles drive from my house and I bet that I'll get there first.
 
Wow 1k/month hoa??? holy hell does it come with room service from a private butler? Btw, you can keep your beach, I'll gladly take my mountain lake that is about 10 miles drive from my house and I bet that I'll get there first.

It's the building where some of the baseball players live during the season, if that's any indication.

He actually moved back to Pittsburg to take a job for a few years and rented his unit out for about $4k/mo. Mortgage is pretty much paid off so he's doing well.
 
im not in SF, but in a very desirable place in socal. here a one bedroom is about 1700-1900. yeah i know i can live in a 4000sq house somewhere else in the country, but im going hiking by the beach tomorrow morning, yea its only a 3-mile drive from my apartment. you can't do that anywhere else.

For those of us in coastal California, the mandatory philosophy to live by is "there's more to life than minimizing cost."

Granted, when you have Chinese cash investors buying up RE and .com money flowing like the mighty Mississippi, you can have your cake and eat it too.
 
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You pretty much have to have a partner/gf/bf just to share the cost or bunker up or you gonna be broke living in SF.

As a pharmacist, I'd take SD for 1/2 the price any day. Way less traffic, 76F average, not overcast all the time, warmer beaches, great hiking place, good place to raise family. You need to pay me at least 1.5X normal salary to go to SF to balance out the cost of living.
 
Agreed. SoCal >>> NorCal.

As a future MD, I wouldn't move back to the Bay Area (grew up there). Tech nerds and Asian immmigrants, those sound like two fun groups to be around.
 
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You pretty much have to have a partner/gf/bf just to share the cost or bunker up or you gonna be broke living in SF.

As a pharmacist, I'd take SD for 1/2 the price any day. Way less traffic, 76F average, not overcast all the time, warmer beaches, great hiking place, good place to raise family. You need to pay me at least 1.5X normal salary to go to SF to balance out the cost of living.

I would have faced a $30,000 pay cut moving to San Diego doing a lateral move with work.

I'm not crazy enough to live in SF proper and where I would have lived in SD, the COL was about the same.

Golden handcuffs, anyone?
 
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socal is great, as long as you are within 5 miles of the coast. more than 5 miles, the weather gets too hot for me, also 5 miles is as far as im willing to go, more than that, its too far from the beach. all the best things about california are near the coast. also, all the amazing cities/neighborhoods to live are also close to the coast.
 
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P.s. the place I'm going to work at is probably 2 miles away from Berkeley bart, so ill have to drive...let's say I live right near union square, how long will it take me to work? 30mins or an hour?
 
How did the 49ers lose to OAKLAND?!?!

Oakland played like they had nothing to lose, Santa Clara 49ers played like ****.

It was a good year, at least we have a world class baseball team within city limits.
 
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Oakland played like they had nothing to lose, Santa Clara 49ers played like ****.

It was a good year, at least we have a world class baseball team within city limits.

Santa Clara 49ers, I like that :) aside from the fact that there's additional traffic here because of the stadium. I can pretend now that I live in a city (and no, SJ doesn't count, it's a giant suburb).
 
http://blog.sfgate.com/stew/2014/12/08/census-numbers-increase-in-wealthy-bay-area-sf-residents

Just so you guys know the other side of the "cost of rent" equation, you're facing a majority of households bringing in > $150,000 yr in many pockets within the city. The only reason this isn't higher is because rent control has allowed some to pay extremely below market rents, or people converting spare rooms and garages into rentals to subsidize their own housing costs.

The other part of it is foreign nationals buying property for rental and/or using it as their pied-à-terre.
 
P.s. the place I'm going to work at is probably 2 miles away from Berkeley bart, so ill have to drive...let's say I live right near union square, how long will it take me to work? 30mins or an hour?

Anti-commute direction (assuming you work during the day) I'll say it's just under 30 mins door to door, barring any major traffic delays.
 
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Oakland played like they had nothing to lose, Santa Clara 49ers played like ****.

It was a good year, at least we have a world class baseball team within city limits.

If CK continues to start for the S.C. 49ers, it's a possibility they might be in last place in midst of that dangerous NFC West. Jim Harbaugh is probably gone too.

Yep, the S.F. Giants are impressive. They don't spend like the L.A. Dodgers, but they are always in contention to win championships. It'd be nice to see Clayton Kershaw win a WS, though. He's a f*cking machine.
 
If CK continues to start for the S.C. 49ers, it's a possibility they might be in last place in midst of that dangerous NFC West. Jim Harbaugh is probably gone too.

Yep, the S.F. Giants are impressive. They don't spend like the L.A. Dodgers, but they are always in contention to win championships. It'd be nice to see Clayton Kershaw win a WS, though. He's a f*cking machine.

He's a machine until October, then it's like a whole new pitcher. If he can solve that, then maybe...just maybe...we'll see a Dodgers/Giants Pennant series.

As for the Niners, yeah I can't argue with that. All I know is the past few years has been WAY better than being 2-14, 4-12, 7-9, 5-11, etc... I'll take what I can get when I get it, hah.
 
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I timed myself earlier and it was like 15 mins to cross the bay freeway-to-freeway, so 30mins is about right for door to door SF to Berkeley.

I got bored and filmed it, here's the time lapse, hah:

 
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I timed myself earlier and it was like 15 mins to cross the bay freeway-to-freeway, so 30mins is about right for door to door SF to Berkeley.

I got bored and filmed it, here's the time lapse, hah:



haha o wow nice! was this during morning rush? if it was, then it's awesome
 
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