When taking a place on a six month contract with it to run on with two months' notice thereafter, I've made up for the lack of "normality", i.e. no employer salary cheque, etc., by paying the six months rent up front and then reverting to the normal monthly rent payment. Every landlord so far has agreed. It may help to think of ways you can persuade a landlord, and often than means paying more money (the interest I lost -- not much).

Were you trying to rent a house in Atherton? Group renting is very common in the Valley. In San Francisco it is the default housing situation for almost anyone under the age of 30.

No - Palo Alto and Mountain View were the focus.

There was 4 of us, each working at very well known companies and making each over $100k/yr, so we wanted a nice 4-5 bedroom house preferably with a pool and plenty of parking. Those types of homes were not very common and the 5 we found _really_ didn't want to rent their home to a misfit group of mid to late 20 somethings.

I was wondering about this, thanks for the info! I'm sure owners won't look too kindly on self-employed entrepreneurs either ;)

With a big down payment they shouldn't have to care.