- Jian Jiao left the Bay Area in 2021 and moved his family to Austin, Texas.
- Jiao was the first of his friends to move but now worries Austin will become like San Francisco.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Jian Jiao, the principal data engineer at BP in Austin, Texas. This text has been edited for length and clarity.
I worked at Google in the Sunnyvale-Mountain View area. I had been living in California since graduating from college. My partner and I started considering a move in 2020 during the pandemic. While we liked the area, we worried about its future. The Bay Area social culture and safety were changing.
The Bay Area had a great job market for senior tech roles with many similar people around. But as immigrants to America, we wanted to explore other places to live.
We had a 4-year-old and a newborn at the time. We started looking elsewhere because we wanted to move before our kids were settled in schools with their own networks.
Because of the new baby, we had time off, so we went on a road trip in late 2020 to Orange County and Irvine in Southern California. We liked the areas but weren't that serious about relocating.
Oracle moving to Austin opened our eyes to Texas
It was about that time when the news broke that Oracle was relocating its headquarters to Austin. I used to intern at Oracle, and the move was a big surprise. It expanded our horizons to Texas.
We took a five-day road trip to Austin to check out the city. Five days in a car with a newborn was certainly an adventure. It was very different from the Bay Area, but we liked it.
Around Christmas, I spoke with a real-estate agent and began the process of buying a house in Austin. I also asked whether Google would consider relocating me to Austin, and I got the OK.
While Google was processing my internal transfer, I got a job as a vice president at BP in Austin. We moved in June 2021.
We were the early pioneers of moving to Austin from the Bay Area
I remember one friend shaking my hand goodbye, telling me he'd see me in a year. He said, "You'll hate Austin. It's hot, boring, and there's no Asian population."
Within six months of our move, three other families from around San Francisco with whom we were friends had moved to Austin.
I didn't leave the Bay Area because of any negative perceptions of San Francisco, but since we've moved, it seems like there's been an increase in negative news, such as a rise in petty crime and worsening wildfires.
What surprised us when we first got to Austin
Firstly, the house prices were higher than we'd expected — though not as bad as in the Bay Area.
Also, the people in Austin are very friendly. They will wave at you from their cars even if they don't know you — it took some getting used to.
Austin has a smaller Asian population than the Bay Area but a more diverse population, in my experience. In the Bay Area, the majority of the international community comes from Asian countries.
Moving to Austin made me realize how similar the people I interacted with in the Bay Area were. Now I meet people with different jobs, such as husbandry or chemistry, living in the south of Austin.
Austin is expensive for Texas but cheap compared with the Bay Area. It's hard to directly compare the cost of living with San Francisco's because we have more land here and different costs, such as lawn care and general maintenance of a bigger property. But I'd say Austin is at least 20% to 30% cheaper for average living costs.
For us, it felt cheaper, but I've had friends who moved from other parts of the US to Austin only to move again to Dallas because they found it too expensive.
The pros and cons of living in Austin
The traffic is quite bad in Austin because the infrastructure hasn't had time to catch up with the influx of people. Every week, it seems like there's new roadwork — but it's not coming fast enough.
Another consequence of the influx of residents is that we've found it very hard and expensive to find a handyworker, plumber, or electrician. They are very busy, and the quality isn't consistent, but it's given me an opportunity to learn some skills around the house.
In Austin, you experience all the seasons; in San Francisco, the weather doesn't vary massively. The seasons are more extreme; icy winters in Austin can damage pipes and cause trees to fall. In the summer, it gets too hot for our kids to play outside.
When the weather is temperate, Austin has great access to nature with the river and hill country.
The city is good for driving. You can get to Dallas, San Antonio, and Houston in three hours by car. But for international flights, it's not as connected as a big city such as San Francisco.
When my parents flew in from Beijing, they had multiple direct flights into the Bay Area. But now, I have to meet them in San Francisco and travel with them to Austin because they don't speak English and there are no direct flights. The connecting flight is always in the middle of the night.
The North Austin-South Austin divide
Most of the new developments are in north Austin because that's where the tech hubs have been set up.
We live in South Austin because it's more family-friendly and greener, and the school I wanted to send my kids to was there. However, we had to sacrifice the conveniences of living in the north, where there are more Asian grocery stores and other amenities.
North Austin feels as if it's becoming like the Bay Area. I wouldn't want to live there because it's the same as where we came from.
In the two years we've lived here, there's been a lot of change. The north and east of Austin are filling with property developments, and Highway 290 is being expanded from two lanes to six.
I want to see the city flourish, but I don't want Austin to become another Bay Area. I think Austin has room to grow — I just hope it's an organized change.
I recommend Austin, but it's not for everyone
My advice to people moving to Austin from the Bay Area is to have a clear purpose. Don't move just because you want a bigger house — you'll have to make sacrifices living in a smaller city, including fewer conveniences and more extreme weather. You need a better reason — be it your kids' education or more diversity.
People think Austin is more affordable than it is, but you get to live in an interesting, beautiful city. It may not be for everyone, but I'd recommend living here.