San Francisco, California

milkandsalsa
Living in San Francisco
1y ago
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SF is fantastic for small children. I am walking distance from three safe, new, playgrounds. SF is very park oriented, and nowhere in the city is farther than a ten minute walk from a park.

People often move out of the city when they have kids, but that’s because the city is so expensive. The school system is also a bit unusual because it currently uses a “lottery” system where you could end up assigned to a school nowhere near your home. They are supposedly changing this system in the next few years, though they keep pushing back this deadline. The schools in the Richmond and Sunset neighborhoods are good, and there’s always private school if you can afford it ($40k a year, per kid). Mine are not yet school age so I can’t weigh in, but my many of my friends have their kids in public school and love it.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/2022/best-new-san-francisco-parks/

https://secretsanfrancisco.com/best-playgrounds-sf/

PracticalPirate207
Living in San Francisco
Updated 1y ago
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I don't think it's changed much. The biggest change is just downtown which has always been a much different feel from the rest of SF. Even the downtown problem isn't as much homelessness as it is a problem of businesses closing & lack of foot traffic.

90% of the city is lovely. You'll find a stray crazy person here and there. The really nice areas that are fun / lowkey are Lower Pac Heights, Hayes Valley, Noe Valley, and Inner Richmond.

The other 10% are ares that are uncomfortable or areas you should definitely avoid. The thing about SF is that some nice areas are next to kind of sketch areas. For example, 19th and Valencia is really bougie, but the adjacent parallel Mission Street is just a little uncomfortable. Upper Haight is generally pretty nice, but may encounter some homeless on Clayton.

Then there are areas that you see in the news. These are really specific blighted areas like Hyde & Eddy or Mission & 6th.

I'm just one perspective of many, but I love this city and all the surrounding geography.

emasculine
Living in San Francisco
2y ago
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The media is hysterical; that's their job. the bay area is still great even though it has challenges. San Francisco is great even though it has challenges. no, there is not shit and needles covering every sidewalk in the city. yes, there are problems with both in some areas., most of which are pretty easy to avoid. do we wish that just once we could get a competent government to deal with a lot of the structural issues? yes. is it the dystopian hell that republicans -- especially ones who have never even been here -- want to hype up? no. considering they have issues with homelessness in their enclaves too, it shows they don't have any better ideas.

malavois
Living in San Francisco
2y ago
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I think it depends. All the things everyone has been saying about the income inequality are absolutely correct; the housing market is bonkers and you do have to have a fairly fat income to live the classic American middle-class lifestyle. I work a state government job and have lots of student debt, and if I wasn’t in a relationship with someone who makes a lot of money and paid off all of their loans, I would never be able to live in a house.

But, it depends on what you want. It’s totally feasible to live in an apartment, even one that’s close to the heart of the city. Public transit hasn’t shrunk or grown much, so what you remember about how easy/hard it is to get around is basically the same. For the most part, most of the great beautiful amazing things in the city haven’t permanently closed or fallen into decrepitude due to COVID, certainly not as many as I feared. Drinks and meals cost about the same as they do in most other big affluent cities.

Obviously, COVID changed a lot, but I’ve come to appreciate the city so much more since being stuck at home all the time. I’ve taken so many walks and drives and have a truly renewed appreciation for SF history, architecture, micro-climates/neighborhoods, natural features, etc. etc. It helps to be politically liberal since many policies that get discussed and implemented are social and environmental programs (though there’s still a long way to go in terms of using those programs to correct many of the destructive actions of the past). If San Francisco ever seemed like a place you’d want to be, you can still find that here.

What it's really like to live in San Francisco (one year later)

my unfiltered, honest review of what life is actually like in SF.

not trying to sell you on the city, not trying to create any propoganda for San Francisco, just providing my lens of what your first year of living there may look like. i can't possibly speak for the hugely diverse array of voices in the city, just offering my perspective.

Gentrification resources: https://www.urbandisplacement.org/res…

My SF apartment hunt: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQoNt…

What I spend in a month in SF: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ic2OM…

Living In San Francisco VS Oakland | Moving To California