[avenoir]

I moved to Denver about a year ago. It's all subjective of course, but I really struggle to understand the benefits of living in Boulder outside of a more vibrant tech scene and being a nice cozy town. The rent is ~$300-$400 more expensive. The trails are absolutely packed with people. There is beer pong and loud parties on every corner in the summer. Yes, it's a little closer to skiing resorts, but we're talking extra 20 minutes. Yet, whenever I talk to folks there they seem to enjoy it while I can't help but feel out of place surrounded by college kids everywhere.

[saryant]

If you aren't on the hill or a in a tiny handful of bars on Pearl, you never run into the college kids. They mostly stay south of the creek, with the exception of the dive bars on Pearl (and Absinthe House, but that place is a dump anyways).

I've lived here for three years, go out every weekend and never once have I seen anyone playing beer pong.

[avenoir]

Yeah, like I thought, it's a little subjective. I'm just hanging out at the wrong places with folks there :)

[shostack]

I've heard home prices are Bay Area level without similar salaries there, is that accurate? And how does that stack up against Denver?

The job market seems relatively weak in both areas compared to the Bay Area... Would you agree with that?

[avenoir]

I don't think anything in Denver or Boulder stacks up to astronomical prices of the Bay Area. You can easily get a nice house 20 minutes from Denver for $300K. If you're looking in Denver proper, you're looking at $500K-$1M+ (Cherry Creek or similar). But you get much much more bang for your buck (we're talking a nice house). A $1M property in SF is like, what, some land with a dilapidated property? Boulder's housing market is going to be significantly more expensive. I'm only familiar with rent prices there. Maybe somebody else can comment on the housing market. But again, I don't think it's anywhere close to the Bay Area prices. At least not in terms of what you get for the same money.

Boulder has more tech jobs. There are big guys like Twitter, Google and a gazillion of startups like VictorOps and SendGrid. Denver's lacking but I don't think it's too far behind. The fun stuff is pretty much all in Boulder though. Maybe the current construction boom will change that a bit.

I can't comment on salaries. I work remotely for a company that isn't in Denver, but I can just say you can live lavishly here if you make $120K+. And if you have some money to burn, it's a perfect time to invest in some property. The entire Denver area is under construction right now.