I went through this calculus many times for other places to live.
For comparison, in the neighborhood Fred Smith lives in (founder of FedEx), 4-7 million would get you a very significant estate - main house, guest house, pool, tennis court, barn, horses, lake, etc. Crazy how different things can be.
No private lake, but I'll match my views of the SF to Oakland skyline while windsurfing with most others... with only the views sailing from Crissy Field beneath the Golden Gate Bridge topping it.
I'm not sure about Fred's neighbors, but here it is packed with extremely intelligent people where many of them did other activities with skill to get into the top schools the tech companies hire from. In my 20s, I played softball and volleyball in the HP league then moved on to play volleyball in an industrial league. I played tennis in high school and made a Junior Davis team but wasn't nearly good enough to bother trying to play in college (UC is division 1 but I doubt I'd make division 3....) I took it up again in my 20s with people I worked with who were really good and it was fun. In my 30s I joined the HP golf league and had fun, winning a trophy for low net by being consistently bad, then took up windsurfing which I became addicted to.
There are theater nerds that play techie by day and theater in the evenings - I actually dated one who played Sally Bowles (Liza Minnelli's role) in Cabaret at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts shortly after it opened.
The bike riding is world class as is the sailing and so many other sports.
My neighbor's have pools they seldom use... but I swam with the Rinconada Masters for awhile too in my 20s when I worked in Palo Alto... but there are many pools in clubs I can use including the one at the health club where I take yoga classes.
The horse riding is good for those who like it but it is expensive for upkeep. Some homes have the land for it but most board their horses at riding clubs.
It is nice to have enough land to say is your own.... our family has land way out in the boonies but really only a 3 or 4 hr drive if I wish to visit. I gave up my share to brothers who have kids to pass it on to and who will use it.
What we do here is have small lots for personal use then families over generations donate land to the public trust so we have hiking parks all over.... many with views of the Pacific Ocean or the SF Bay.
It is really amazing how easily and quickly you can get away from crowds... such as the 3.3 mile hike I just returned from leaving my door, hiking downtown and back with many beautiful gardens and trees. I even got to see one of the new Ferrari's driving by...what a sound but one can probably buy a house with that car in most places! I bet Lizzy would say nobody deserves a car like that and AOC would say it uses too much fossil fuel... while I just enjoyed hearing as much as watching it drive by. |
