Silicon Valley Schools and Home Prices?

You will probably want to rent a house. 350K will not buy you much over here. If you want to buy in a neighborhood with a good school district, you will need a minimum of 850K. Santa Clara and Cupertino are both expensive and have good school districts. The commute from Livermore would be horrible. Traffic is always bad from there. They have "toll lanes" to get you around faster, but why pay during heavy commute times. Think South San Jose and Morgan Hill as suggested below. The houses are more affordable and the commute is bad, but not as bad as coming from Livermore. Good Luck

No, you won't find a home in that price range, except maybe East Palo Alto (and you don't want to go there). I looked for a condo when I was single and was looking at around 350k around the entire Silicon Valley and that was going to get me a 2 br./1 ba. condo (never did find anything I wanted). When I got married and we tried to buy a home in San Jose in 2000, we were looking at the 425k price range and that was going to get us a 3 br./1 ba. 50-year-old fixer-upper with a horrible inspection report. That was in the Cambrian area of San Jose, which is ok, with ok schools -- nothing "wow," but nothing horrible.

The commute from Livermore to Santa Clara would not be a pretty one. A lot of traffic, unless you're not commuting during peak rush hour. Stop and go.

Before accepting the offer, I would contact a realtor in the area and ask for candid feedback on what you could expect house-hunting.

I'm not sure you will be able to find anything in that range, unless you want a longer drive... an hour or more. I lived (and grew up in Los Gatos) until about a year ago. It's really expensive to live in SV but I LOVE IT!! My husband has a long drive 1.5 each way.

I just spent 5 years in the Silicon Valley. The weather's nice, there's nice things to enjoy outside, and an amazingly wonderfully diverse community of people. It ain't cheap. I hail from Portland, OR where a good 3 bedroom house is attainable for under 400k or rented for 1400 a month. We lived in Mountain View, which was pleasant, in a tiny, dark 3 BR duplex on a busy street and paid $1800/month. This was considered a steal. The duplex wound up selling for (brace yourself) 850k! The realtors from the office handling the sale and purchase were very pleasant - https://www.coldwellbanker.com/agent?action=detail&ag...

I'd suggest renting somewhere you feel good about then look into housing prices, neighborhoods, commutes and such once you're there and settled. Santa Clara is close to Sunnyvale, which has some pleasant afforable nooks. San Jose also has some nice spots. I'd say a good school and pleasant neighborhood should be your first targets, as well as starting to rake in Silicon Valley wages (which still don't really match the general housing market). . Not sure how anyone who's not super rich affords a home down there!

Best of luck and enjoy California!

The commute from Livermore to Santa Clara could be bad (maybe an hour) all the way to awful (over an hour and a half) depending on where in each city, and what time of day you leave. If you can get to work super early or super late, it's more like an hour. But during regular commute time you're going to be in stop and go traffic for the entire 33 miles.

For $350,000 in Livermore - I wouldn't say the neighborhoods are desirable, but they're not horrible. It all depends on your expectations. If you're expecting a 2500 sq foot home on 1/4 acre that is renovated, you'll be disappointed. But if you're open to a condo (I know you said you weren't) or an older home on a city lot in need of repairs, you can get in at that price point. California schools aren't amazing except in the more expensive locations. Livermore or the other less expensive suburbs near San Jose and Santa Clara will have adequate schools, but not anywhere as good as Plano.

I lived north of Santa Clara but my husband commuted there. Livermore to Santa Clara would be a nightmare commute. Some place like Morgan Hill, south of San Jose is likely the best bet but I don't know the commute. Sorry but I did laugh when I read your $350k price though.... I don't think you can even get a condo for that. I was north which is more expensive but you have San Jose to the south so I'm sure people move south and commute to San Jose from there, driving up those prices. CA school systems suck too. 48th in spending per pupil I believe in the country. The few very good public HS's tend to be only in mega expensive (think $900-$1k per square foot) towns. We lived in a very good district for elementary school but I'd have insisted on private schools after that. I don't meant to be too discouraging but if you'd said $1mm for a house, I'd still be a bit hesitant that you can get the same quality of schools that you seem to have and not have a long commute. It's a beautiful area and weather is great but California is in a lot of trouble and schools constantly get hit. Ours asked for a $1200 per child per year donation to keep things decent. I'd google houses in Morgan Hill and then Gilroy but that commute might be too much. Even Morgan Hill to Santa Clara might be really tough as you have to get through San Jose. And remember that moving that far out means it gets super hot and has little character to the area. Gilroy is kind of a farm area. Not sure about the schools in either area. Silicon Valley real estate has held up much better than elsewhere in CA.