It’s funny that when I make a decision, I usually realize
that my previous decision sucked. One may call this a way of exploring the
world and a great path to a personal growth.
Or you can just say that I’m an idiot. Depends on your point
of view and how polite and straightforward you are. J
Lessons learned –
- North Beach sucks. It’s like living on the Red
Square in Moscow. Yeah, it’s fun for the first 3 days and then what? Tons of
tourists and tourists-oriented attractions. Plus parking is a nightmare.
- You should never ever live with random roommates
off Craigslist unless you just can’t afford living by yourself and you absolutely
have to share your house with strangers. “I’m too old for this shit” © “Lethal Weapon”. And God forbid you from living with a
landlord with all kind of issues.
- If you work on Peninsula, then driving through
the City alone adds 15-25 minutes to your commute time. Caltrain/Bart is pretty
much a joke.
You know how you sometimes get used to some crap little by
little and lower your standards, and then lower them again, and then you think
"yeah, it's ok, I don’t really need <something>… and it’s not a big
deal that <something> is <something>", etc. But then one day you
finally realize - no, it's not okay. Enough.
Off we go… Craigslist hunting again… Surprisingly, this time
I found a new place in 1 day and I moved just a few days later. I still can’t
believe my luck. San Francisco’s housing market is completely supply-controlled,
so finding something acceptable is hard-to-impossible, unless you’re willing to
pay a lot. I mean a LOT. A normal price for a 1 bedroom place in the
neighborhoods I was interested in would be $3000+/month.
There are some downsides to my new place.
First of all, it’s a temporary sublease until the owners
come back 3 months later and then I’ll have to move again. I feel like a
homeless dude sometimes, although this also gives a great feeling of freedom.
You don’t accumulate all this crap in the house and you can easily move to another
area if you want to. I just wish there were more good affordable places to live
in SF. J
My new neighborhood (Mission) definitely has both pros and
cons. It’s much closer to Peninsula, so my commute is now typically 25-30
minutes (comparing to 40-50 in North Beach).
There’s a lot of young people in the area. Mission is the “heart”
of all the fun in the City – restaurants, hippie-gathering cafes, dive bars, theaters,
etc.
Unfortunately, the part of Mission where I live has a quite
high crime rate. You should always
remember to not leave anything valuable in your cars, otherwise it WILL be
stolen. On the bright side, if anything does get stolen, you can always buy it
back on the corner around here.
I don’t think I would consider buying a condo in this
particular area, but for 3 months it’s perfectly fine. And then when I need to
move again, I’ll search for a place farther south. Mission actually gets very
nice south-west of 22nd street and Valencia.
It has a lot of oversimplifications and generalizations, but many points are very, very true.
So my new (temporary) place is less than $2000/month for 2
bedrooms on the top floor. It’s a pretty awesome place, all clean and sunny. A
normal price would be $3000+/month, but this place is rent-controlled, so…
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Higher resolution photos are here )
