https://www.thrillist.com/lifestyle/london/london-undergroun...
Direct link to large-scale map:
http://assets3.thrillist.com/v1/image/1560005
Note we tend to think of flats in terms of number of bedrooms. Hatton Cross is right next to Heathrow airport, if you're wondering why it is so cheap.
This map has areas of london by square foot for a closer comparison, but isn't by tube stops. Looks like we are more expensive than the bay area, if you go by area - We live in much smaller houses than in America, I believe
However what tips the scales for London being more affordable IMHO is the fact that there is not 500 square miles of water smack in the middle spreading everything out. For instance in London I lived 9 tube stops from the center and it was < 5 miles by bicycle. In the Bay Area I also live 9 BART stops from downtown SF but it is 15 miles, I can't cycle (because no bike path over the bay bridge), and I get less for my money relative to London. Throw on the anemic transit here, and London is much more doable on a budget.
The income disparity in atlanta is insane and getting worse.
http://projects.newyorker.com/story/subway/
And Chicago:
Surprised no one has mentioned the Delmar divide in St Louis.
> edit: Keep down voting squares.
But places that are a bit outlying and don't have a big job market, like much of Marin, sit in a nebulous zone in between: they aren't really "in demand" right now, and that gives the community leverage to stomp out anything that would change that.
Is that really how it's framed?
Prime examples of how public pressures escalated the cost of the system are the Berkeley subway and the Ashby Station. After originally approving a combination aerial and subway line through Berkeley, that city later came to oppose the plan in favor of a subway-only line, which was much more expensive. The new plan necessitated redesign of the Ashby Station from an aerial to a subway facility. Extensive controversy and hearings ensued for the next 2 1/2 years, finally to be resolved by Berkeley residents voting to tax themselves additionally to finance the changes they wanted. Next, a Berkeley City Councilman filed a successful suit to redesign the Ashby Station, yet a second time, asserting the use of skylights in the original plans was not a true subway design. [0]
And indeed, the "nicer" stops on BART tend to be underground, while the "inexpensive" ones are mostly aerial alignments adjacent to freeways. (See the history around "freeway revolts" and you get a similar picture of class/race division.)
In Toronto they can barely give away apartments located near Pearson Airport due to the incessant noise (and some crime, probably associated with the low purchase price of the apartments).
The prices are ~50% of what they are everywhere else in the city.
I mean it's got 3 lines running through it, it's near Alameda's lovely shopping, it's near the freeway, it's quick to both Oakland and SF downtown.
LOTS of housing and options there - even IF there is a new stadium in that area...
[0] In Palo Alto home prices are artificially high in part because the schools are great and it's very hard to build new houses there. In Mountain View and Sunnyvale there is a lot of newer development and the schools are a little worse. This trumps distance.
I've looked at apartments there a couple times, and while it's vastly more affordable than SF, the climate + distance outweighs the upsides (for me anyway).
I've actually thought about moving out of SF proper into Colma someday because it seems underpriced for its location and amenities. Daly City is quite nice too -- agreed that that part of the map looks like the best deals around.
I'm guessing you have one or two additional criteria on your search, but there are a bunch of homes currently for sale that match your stated criteria: http://www.estately.com/37.5981,-122.5977,37.7576,-122.3059?...
(edit: first link was borked)
Peninsula sorted by price: https://www.openlistings.com/z/94134?focus_params_id=172-swe...
If schools are not an issue then you have a lot more options in terms of cost.
The next issue is prevalence of crime/safety. Fremont is a very safe place to live, but as you go along the BART corridor there are variations in this factor.
If you don't mind endless daily commutes then you can also look beyond the Pleasanton/Dublin corridor where there are good schools coming up with relatively affordable home prices.
Fremont schools are a very mixed bag and while they've improved recently thanks to gentrification they're not fantastic historically. There are still quite a few moderately poor schools mixed in the Fremont district.
For your comparison:
http://www.greatschools.org/california/pleasanton/pleasanton...
http://www.greatschools.org/california/fremont/fremont-unifi...
http://www.schoolandhousing.com/mobile/
Mission San Jose in Fremont is one of the top 10 public schools in terms of API & SAT in the state of CA.
Definitely consider proximity to transit: the current surge in employment has lead to a surge in traffic jams. The three main transit systems are BART, Trains (Ace and Amtrak Capitol Corridor), and the Dumbarton Express bus.
Feel free to ask followups -- I'm a born-and-raised.
A lot of the non-Indian people that I have talked to mentioned a desire to move because of that, especially Chinese friends.
1. You're leaving from 4th & King / 22nd Street - This is is because the train PACKS in and the further down the line you're trying to get on, the worse chance you'll have of actually getting a seat and being comfortable.
2. Your company is right off the Caltrain stop - This is because if you have to take a shuttle or some other mode of transportation, you're throwing more randomness in your trip about when you'll make the Caltrain to head back home.
I used to live at the Avalon at 4th and King and work in East Palo Alto and the commute was great for the most part. Rent near any Caltrain stop is not cheap, but you're paying for the convenience of being near transportation. The main issues I had where when I had to get back; If my shuttle was delayed or late for the train I needed to catch, I usually had to end up running or would miss my train. The itself was reliable, but my shuttle driver was not.
What this means is that they have absolutely no way to mitigate minor problems - every problem becomes a major problem. It is not uncommon for them to have a train stall leaving a station, and that leads to half the trains in the system being 20 minutes late. If they have a pedestrian or vehicle collision, things get much worse.
They also only run one train per hour that stops at every station, so your commute is limited to a few train options every day if you're not going between two of the 5-6 most popular stations.
In addition, if you're not working within walking distance of a station, you'll have to take a shuttle, which could easily add 20 minutes to your commute, and have it's own schedule that you need to mesh with caltrain's schedule.
Beware that if you buy a Clipper card, they tend to "forget" your deposit without recourse. The fine is $250 for being caught without proof of payment or jail.
Also, it says this data includes sales from the last six months, which exactly covers the low season for housing sales. I'd be very interested to see this again in September or October.
A semi-related factoid about Orinda: lowest % of passengers who get to/from the station by foot of any in the BART system.
You know what looks crazy? Not factoring in size. We did it and it looked really goofy.
(I'm the founder of Estately)
Price per square foot tends to goes down as square footage goes up.
(For example, a 1700 sq ft home in mountain view will cost you 2 mil. A 3400sq ft one in the same place will cost ~3 mil, not 4 mil).
If you wanted to buy a decrepit 600 sq. ft shack on a 10-acre lot in downtown Woodside, a price per square foot metric might seem like it should be <$1M. In reality the property would sell for $10M+ based on the land value, with the shack having negative value because of the cost to tear it down. (Ob. Steve Jobs Woodside reference here.)
I lobbied to put both on here, but then you end up with an unreadable map.
BART parking is full pretty early ( 7:30 am ) and trains are usually standing room only by the 2nd stop and by the 4th or so its crammed standing.
I am leaving in Oct. I dont plan on paying 3k+ a month ( 1100 sq ft 3BR/2BTH ) with a patch of grass for a yard and having to plan my times to move around commuting hours ( forget heading anywhere nice on the weekend as everyone else is too ). I am 5 minutes away from a BART station by car ( 15 - 20 by bike )
The beach is wonderful, Santa Cruz is nice. the area is great. I have been here 6 years and I am starting to feel like a caged rat ready to bite the other rats for absolutely no reason :)
Anecdotally, half the office (in a small startup) I worked with drove to a BART station, then took BART the rest of the way.
Also, I'd say the sprawl goes pretty far. I grew up in Vacaville, and it was not uncommon to commute into San Francisco. That was 50-something miles away.
[1] http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2013/03/05/san-francisco-bay-area-n...
Not to worry, within another 30 years technology will solve the problem and mass transit will achieve great speeds, like 100 mph. The average commuter train/subway now has to be less than 50 mph.
Get on a train in Mountain View and arrive in San Francisco in 15 minutes.
Also, Rockridge more expensive than Orinda??
Rockridge is likely more expensive PER SQUARE FOOT because Orinda has more space so places are much larger but at the same price or only marginally higher. I mean Stephen Curry just bought a 3.5 million place out there that's pretty darn massive but a small 2 story home in Rockridge starts at like... 800k and not for a nice one either.
Makes sense overall.
