There is no reason why SSF couldn't be a thriving, cool place to live and work. It takes companies like Stripe to take the lead and have a vision.
Right now downtown SSF is totally boring but add a good grocery store (ahem, Berkeley Bowl) a couple cool coffee shops, wine bars and great restaurants and it would be a perfect fine place to live and work - half way between the south bay and SF.
Buy, renovate or build a place or open a restaurant in SSF now while you have than chance. It will be corporate, funky but potentially cool in 5 years with your creative and financial energy in it.
Personally, by living in a large city I'm giving up the ability to own a home in exchange for access to niche resources such as ethnic enclaves, bohemian artist communities, cultural events, groups dedicated to uncommon hobbies, etc. Just having trendy restaurants and coffee shops wouldn't do it for me.
- SSF has been welcoming new housing (see multistory apartments going up along highway)
- SSF has been welcoming businesses. The new biotech clusters are truly shocking, I’d guess another 5 million sq ft of office/lab space is new or under way. Genentech just submitted a plan to double their foot print.
- it has a decent commercial strip, obviously nothing compared to SF, but how could it be
- it has both a Caltrain and BART station, but your point is true about the locations not being ideal
If you’re a 20-something looking for cool restaurants and an ideal car-less life, then yeah, SF is better, but for the remaining 80% of the population, SSF offers a lot.
Thanks, I needed the laugh.
Also, real estate can be found that are still within a range middle class can afford.
Compared to what? A tear down in (an OK part of) San Rafael went for around $800,000 a few months ago. Marin is consistently one of the most expensive counties in the Bay Area and there's relatively little public transit and bridge toll to contend with. Marin is also strongly anti-development.
You're looking at closer to three hours depending on where you're coming from. There is a ferry from Larkspur but transit connectivity and parking are limited. The Tiburon and Sausalito ferries are worse.