[ghaff]

I’m not sure why the downvotes. A tiny fraction of an acre is utterly ordinary or really fairly small in many suburbs and certainly exurbs in many/most areas of the country. Certainly where I live outside of Boston which is generally not considered a LCoL area.

Multiple acres are very normal in my town which is probably at least as close to Boston as Cupertino is to SF.

I understand various attractions of the Bay Area including all the area that is decidedly the ‘burbs but make no mistake that even tiny amounts of land is decidedly insane relative to the areas outside of most other cities including those reasonably considered as tech hubs.

[reissbaker]

Boston isn't comparable to SF — the median income is nearly 50% higher in SF. And Cupertino is one of the richest cities in the US.

[ghaff]

It’s really difficult to compare city statistics. Boston includes some really pretty poor areas like Roxbury and Dorchester that don’t have a real counterpart except for very small areas of SF. The 80% high end of the median only differs by about 10%.

I agree that Boston is very different both because of industry diversity and fewer geographical constraints other than the ocean. But the fact remains that although there are some very expensive communities, many though not all on the ocean, an hour drive gets you to some pretty reasonable pricing—say $500K on multiple acres.