Cost of living near an office is absurd. Houses in all tech hubs in the US are completely blown out (NYC, Bay Area, Los Angeles, Seattle, etc.) [1].
Average house price in Cupertino (not that you'd live directly in the same place) is 2.6+ million. $300-400,000 salary doesn't cut it anymore.
I wouldn't want to finance the average house on the average Apple salary [2] or a doctor's salary [3].
Realistically, to comfortably afford a 3 million house with 10% down assuming 3% financing (good luck getting that now), you'd need clear about $780,000 per year in cash [4].
I give this is a hurdle to working in an office, but it's not a problem with working in an office in and of itself.
If you could live in a 3 bedroom luxury apartment 10 minutes from your office in an area with nice cafes, restaurants, gyms and access to great public transport to airports etc, how would you feel then?
Totally agree. This is my personal barrier towards returning to an office in a "tech city." If I could live a reasonable distance and commute, I'd have no major objection to going to an office at least part time. However, affordability is a giant concern.
Rents will follow mortgage rates as well. I just did a quick lookup of 3 bedrooms around Apple's office in Cupertino and they are about $7,000 or so a month which means you're paying about $90,000 in cash a year in rent.
What if you live like that, and have 10 min commute. And then you change workplace, and their office is 70 minutes away, on the other side of the city. Or your city just sucks to cross even halfway (mine is) due to chokepoints and insane traffic.
Average house price in Cupertino (not that you'd live directly in the same place) is 2.6+ million. $300-400,000 salary doesn't cut it anymore.
I wouldn't want to finance the average house on the average Apple salary [2] or a doctor's salary [3].
Realistically, to comfortably afford a 3 million house with 10% down assuming 3% financing (good luck getting that now), you'd need clear about $780,000 per year in cash [4].
[1] https://www.redfin.com/city/4561/CA/Cupertino/housing-market
[2] https://www.levels.fyi/companies/apple/salaries/software-eng...
[3] https://www1.salary.com/CA/San-Francisco/Doctor-Salary.html
[4] https://www.financialsamurai.com/how-much-should-you-make-to...