The Google Employee Who Opted For a Truck Over Bay Area Rents (dice.com)

Nerval's Lobster writes: A little over a year ago, Google employees on a Quora thread announced they'd discovered an interesting way to live in the ultra-expensive Bay Area: Rather than pay for conventional housing, they resided in trucks and RVs parked near (or on) the company's campus, and took advantage of corporate perks—including free food, gym facilities, and dry cleaning—to get by on a day-by-day basis. Now one Googler, Brandon S., has taken to his blog to describe how he engaged in a little off-grid living within sight of Google's high-tech headquarters. First he spent $10,000 of his Google signing bonus on a 2006 Ford truck with 128 square feet of room in the back, which he filled with a bed, dresser, and coat rack. Google pays for his phone, and he uses the company's gym and cafeterias to eat and shower. For those Bay Area tech pros who think Brandon's lifestyle sounds appealing, his list of drawbacks includes "social suicide," the inconvenience of not having a bathroom or fridge in close proximity, stress, insect infestations, and the upfront costs of purchasing a large-enough vehicle. On the other hand, he's also using the cash savings to rapidly pay down his student loans.

Comments

alternately:

[Thud457]

or, you know, google could pay a living wage.
Time to unionize, boys!

Re:alternately:

[CastrTroy]

I think it's time for companies (and tech companies especially) to start to encourage more remote workers. The only reason this is a problem is because it's a requirement for the employees to live in the Bay area, where housing prices are out of control. If they could live in Kansas, North Dakota, or Detroit, than they wouldn't have any problems with getting a nice place for a reasonable amount of money.

Re:alternately:

[thejuggler]

Absolutely correct! Several cities/urban centers around the county have artificially inflated housing prices because they are restricting new housing developments. This is part of the tenets of preventing "Urban Sprawl". Maybe Google could add Google Condos/Flats/Apartments to their campus? Hmm, well that would require Government approval too.

Re:alternately:

[ArmoredDragon]

Really? Japan has worse earthquakes (higher magnitude, more frequent) and MASSIVE skyscrapers. It's all about engineering.

Re:alternately:

[ShanghaiBill]

Cleveland, Pittsburg, Detroit, and Upstate NY are all good locations

Bangalore, Mumbai, and Manila are also nice locations. Once you go remote, why stop at the border?

Re:alternately:

[NotDrWho]

or, you know, google could pay a living wage.

If I were Google (or any other tech company), I would be more inclined to relocate to a city where my employees didn't have to live to live in their cars because the Smugville hippies and greedy homeowners have decided it would be a good idea to basically prohibit all new housing construction.

Seriously, do you really NEED to be in SF that badly? Is it really that ESSENTIAL? If you need to kiss-ass in Silicon Valley that badly just to keep up your tech cred, just locate an Office of Bunghole-Tonguing branch office there and locate your main campus somewhere with available affordable housing.

Re:alternately:

[tlambert]

Because barracks were not considered "housing"?

Because it would detract from the income of small apartment complexes who wanted to rent to Google and Facebook employees, and charge them huge rents.

Re:alternately:

[ShanghaiBill]

Because I can't walk down a clean sidewalk to the corner store and pick up my standard groceries without being accosted or worse?

If you believe that Bangalore and Manila are more dirty and dangerous than Detroit, then you need to get a passport and go see the world.

Re:alternately:

[RubberDogBone]

Something is worth what someone is willing to pay.

Re:alternately:

[techno-vampire]

Take a look at Downtown Los Angeles. Same type of earthquake hazards as San Francisco, very strict building code and lots of high-rise buildings.

Re:alternately:

[JesseMcDonald]

... just because the greedy owner thinks he can charge a million. In a more normal country, this is called extortion.

First, that isn't what extortion means:

ex-tor-tion
noun
the practice of obtaining something, especially money, through force or threats.

No one is using force or threats here. If you don't want to pay that much, fine—someone else will; that's why the price is so high.

Second, that "greedy" owner is only doing what any owner of any kind of property has every right to do: choose to sell, or not, on his or her own terms. If the owner doesn't want to sell, the owner doesn't have to sell. Taking the property without the owner's permission, or threatening the owner with fines or other loss of property or liberty for refusing to sell (or equivalently, for asking for "too high" a price) would be extortion.

Cautionary tale

[kheldan]

Don't Be This Guy! is the takeaway. He isn't living, he's merely existing, and worse, he's existing only to do his corporate masters' bidding.

Re:Cautionary tale

[twotacocombo]

He's living with the conscious decision of enduring mild, planned hardship now with the goal of greatly improving his situation in life later. He is taking advantage of the environment and resources available to him to meet his needs, instead of blindly blowing the majority of his income on what others feel should be an acceptable quality of life for him. Why would you consider forward thinking and aggressive budgeting a 'cautionary tale'? He's got a plan and motivation, which a lot more than I can say about most of the people I work with.

Math

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

>> 90% of my after-tax income, and throwing that in student loans...$22,434 worth of student loans, and has paid it down to $16,449...four months

That's only $1,500 paid down on student loans per month. If that's 90% of his after-tax income (even in California), he's making maybe $22K/year, and spending just $150 month on other stuff.

That's absurd. It's like this all over the world.

[Brannon]

Housing prices are higher than "the cost to build" in major metropolitan areas all over the world (London, Paris, Rome, Moscow, etc., etc.).

Your definition of 'normal' is abnormal.