I'm moving to Silicon Valley and living in my car | Hacker News Reader

I'm moving to Silicon Valley and living in my car

kurtvarner.com

71 pointsboopsie102 comments

I went crazy one time and decided to leave Silicon Valley and live out of my car in southern California. I saw a lot, met characters, and learned lots more.

Biggest takeaway: the idea bordered between impractical and stupid. But I was 24 and I thought I knew better. Also, I was 24, I could tolerate being stupid.

Other takeaways:

1. Buy a Costco 24 Hour Fitness membership. You now have access to facilities around the country.

2. Make friends with 7/11 clerks, the nice ones got your back at night for a few days at a time.

3. Pack a baseball bat. Seriously.

4. Bring a tent and camping chairs.

5. Very few bums and vagrants have good stories but the ones that do are worth their weight in gold.

At the end of the day you're going to spend more time and effort figuring out how to survive than working. This becomes a huge drag after the magic fades the first week.

And, oh yeah, if you want to be full on relentless: make friends with big corp employees in Mtn View and Palo Alto to partake in their cafeterias. Or figure out how to do the tailgating dance.

Thanks for the Advice. However, I'm going to disagree about your point on productivity. I'll be spending all my waking hours in coworking locations, and the only time spent in my car will be for sleep. Finding showers are the only thing that may become a distraction. If that proves to be the case, I will get a gym membership.

See my other comment, but I think you underestimate the physical and mental strain something like this usually entails. Hey if you are going to do it you are going to do it, more power to you. Go get em!

I just think "being tired" in all senses of the word is a pretty impactful thing. As a young person I never understood why people would complain about xyz, to me, through my ignorant ass teenaged eyes I thought everyone was just weak-minded and dumb.

When you are young you are invincible sorta thing. And hell I'm still young but now I seriously think .. damn I'm tired. Damn it sucks to get sick. Damn what if this, what if that. I overdosed on caffeine recently. That sounds pretty "funny" actually, but caffeine is a real drug and suffice to say I completely tripped out. One of the worst experiences. Long story short it made me really really really really prioritize a healthy lifestyle. I don't want to feel unhealthy, its not worth it.

Mom was right. Eat your vegetables, balanced diet. Exercise every day. Take a minute to relax. Love your friends. See the sun.

Ok shutting up now.

High five! Maturity rocks!

That's good advice. One of the first things I do when I move is find a gym. I find it really helps to break the day up and go work out for a bit. When I finish and get back to work it is almost like starting another day.

How long do you work til? Going to the gym for me would entail: getting ready, driving there, working out for an hour, driving home, showering and then getting back to work. Seems nice in theory but it'd be way too disruptive for me.

I usually wake up at 8 and work until around 12. I'll go to the gym and be ready for work by about 2. Most of the time I'll work until my girlfriend comes back from work which is around 10pm. I try to do a minimum of 8 hours a day with a few breaks in the day. Some days I'll do 3-4 hours but because I tend to do 6 days a week (and quite frequently 7) it is not a big deal.

I'm currently living in Toronto, Canada (I'm from Australia). I don't really know anybody here so I have nothing better to do than work. I take time off for the gym, food and when my girlfriend has time off work. This way she stays happy and I get to work as much as I want.

Reminds me of Bing Gordon's talk at CEO summit about how professional ball players go out to the field and deliver consistently in comparison to rookies. Consistency matters. This is the single most import thing which sets them apart. They bring in the goods every day. It is a marathon not a sprint. To do marathons, you need discipline, be balanced and be grounded. Experience teaches you a ton. You learn how to balance, keep your sanity while hitting the ball out of the park consistently. When I was young and felt invincible, I would code all night, had lots of unhealthy food, had irregular sleeping patterns, and looked down on old-experienced developers who balanced work/coding with everything else in their lives. As I got older, I realized how naive and stupid I was to have such a skewed perspective.

Don't forget worrying.

OP, SF is an epicenter of car break-ins. Chances are high that you're gonna get your stuff stolen. If you're lucky, it won't be your tech gear cuz you'll be in a coworking spot (good luck finding parking - I have memories of driving around for an hour+). But it would suck to have your clothes, blankets, sleeping bag, and other things stolen. Thieves in other cities won't bother with that stuff, but SF is different.

I have to agree with appsurd. This sounds like a great idea right now, and you've worked everything out--wait until you've down it for a week.

I moved up to Portlandia from LA to intern at Vizify and thought it would go according to the plan as well. I was also going to document my process as I thought it would make for some interesting content.

I thought the condition would create a pressure that would make me perform and produce more--all it did was create a pressure of homelessness, which killed my productivity. I was always tired and depressed AND dirty.

You're plan makes sense conceptually--but wait till you're actually there and homeless. Figure out an alternative otherwise your productivity will suffer big time and you might as well stay home and make shit happen there.

Good luck!!!

Wouldn't you be much more productive if you were well rested (sleeping in a car isn't all that comfortable in my experience) and not constantly worried about hunting down the next shower, even discounting the time you'll spend on doing so? Having gone through an eviction taught me it's hard to focus on your work when you're worried about your basic needs.

Some of my friends have lived your dream lifestyle for a few years now, in their cars/RVs, on couches, or literally in tents. Freedom isn't quite free.

But then again Silicon Valley is moving closer to mirroring bullshitty Hollywood scene. I see you got some hits from hackey tech news blogs so you're already up a few. Ride the hype for as long as you can.

I would rather in 4 months time smile seeing you write a blog post about how you sold your company for a mil than anything.

Take care and good luck.

> 5. Very few bums and vagrants have good stories but the ones that do are worth their weight in gold.

Many have Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome from alcoholism and will lie about absolutely anything. If you are bored and stuck hanging out with vagrants, you can make up a story that involves you and them, and they will jump right in. Like, "remember, what was it 5 years ago... that we took the trip to Alaska to go moose hunting." They will remember and fill in the details. A very strange disorder from a lack of thiamine. Even though the conversation is complete fiction, they enjoy the story time.

I hope this works out for him, but it seems kind of dumb.

It'd make more sense if he were single and living in the middle of Kansas or something. Even then it'd seem like a last ditch effort.

But it just seems silly when he has a wife and a house and is only going 250 miles away. And all of it for an alarm clock app?

It doesn't matter the distance. The fact is that LA is cannot compare to the Silicon Valley. See PG's posts on the topic http://www.paulgraham.com/startuphubs.html and http://paulgraham.com/hubs.html

Yes, but it's, what, a six hour drive? Not great, I grant you, but you could work for a few days in LA, then drive to SV, stay for a few days, meet the people you need to meet, then drive back to LA. Once things start happening you can make a permanent move.

I know it sounds like a waste of time, but you're going to lose a hell of a lot of time dealing with the inconvenience of living in a car.

I think you're missing the point. I will be staying in Palo Alto full-time. I won't be commuting to LA very often.

No, I understand that is the point. What I am saying is that I think that the benefits of being in Palo Alto full-time and sleeping in a car are minimal (at best) when compared to working in LA and travelling to Palo Alto as needed, until you get set up and on your way.

I can understand wanting to be in SV for the networking opportunities and so on. But you can code anywhere, including in your home in LA, and the results will be the same.

SV is a fantastic place to create a startup, but it isn't the only place you can ever do it- I'm in NYC and plenty here have no trouble. Presuming that the only reason you haven't been successful is because you haven't got to SV yet is a very dangerous path of thinking.

Parisoma is in SF.

One last comment... you need to stop touting around these essays as if they're canon. This isn't the promise land.

It seems like you're doing this for all the wrong reasons and totally missing the point in all the stories where people struggle and eventually become successful.

LA is close enough to Silicon Valley that you could fake it pretty easy, without the huge inconvenience of living in a car. Learn a few popular hang outs and meeting places and commute up a few times a week. Schedule meetings and appointments to coincide with the days you drive up.

And living in Silicon Valley isn't going to make a bad startup idea any good.

Why not start in LA and move to Silicon Valley when you get things off the ground?

It's absolutely worth it to be here, that's for sure. I never would have met my cofounders otherwise. Warning - it took me four months to meet them after I moved here.

Dude, I live here, and I love the connections I make here. Your plan is still ridiculous, unless what you wanted was media attention, in which case, congratulations.

Development requires more than just attitude and being in the right location. You need to sleep and eat well.

If you are sure you really need to be here, and want to do it on the cheap, then hit Craigslist and get a room in a shared house somewhere in the peninsula.

I think this is really silly. How is living uncomfortably in a car make you relentlessly resourceful? It seems entirely counter productive. You won't get good rest and even have a decent work environment. Half the fun of creating a start-up is not having to go to an office every day in peak hour traffic.

Right now I'm sitting outside in my backyard working away. It's a beautiful quite day and I have already achieved heaps. If you already have a nice apartment then you're better off working from there.

Because I know the value of being in the Silicon Valley, and I'm doing whatever it takes to be in that environment. And surprisingly, my set up is not uncomfortable for sleeping.

As for working, most of my time will be spent in coworking spaces. Spending 16 hours a day in a workspace won't hurt my productivity.

I tried looking for your resume after reading this comment (I downvoted you).

If you think working 16 hours a day makes you more productive, I'd have to imagine you are not an experienced developer.

If he works 16 hours a day, gets enough exercise, and gets enough sleep, he will likely be extremely productive. Having not much place else to go but his working space will encourage that.

Not everyone has the same cookie-cutter brain that you imagine.

No, but a lot of people seem to work on the basis that "more is more". While it's possible that this guy is uber-productive in 16 hour blocks, it's unlikely. It's a recipe to burn out.

I am friends with much of my city's homeless population (including some people who sleep in their cars), so I have a bit of insight into some of the problems that this fellow will face. Have you considered:

- Where will you wash your clothes?

- Where will you store your clothes in between washing them? They will end up quite badly wrinkled. Do you have any idea how hard it will be to go into an important meeting looking like you slept in your clothes? Even if the people you're meeting are cool, it will take your confidence down a notch (or seven).

- What is your backup plan in case of a catastrophe? (ie - what do you do if your car gets towed?)

- Personal safety. The streets are full of predators who roam them in search of easy prey. Sleeping in your car puts a big target on your back. Sleeping in your car with a laptop/other tech equipment puts an even bigger target on your back. Be very, very careful.

- Apartment envy. Becoming homeless is as big (if not a bigger) culture shock than moving halfway around the world. Based on conversations with people who have become homeless, you will go through points where you miss how easy your 'old life' was. Building a startup contains the same kinds of lows. What will you do if the no apartment low coincides with a bad startup low? You don't have a support system in SF...

I'm not trying to dissuade you, but I feel like I owe you a bit of my knowledge. Best of luck and please be safe - both physically and emotionally.

You are trying to short-cut through Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, and I don't think you will win.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslows_hierarchy_of_needs

Maslow states that in order to achieve the high levels of self-actualization, ie. creativity, problem solving, etc, you need to have solved the other problems of life, ie. physical safety, love, companionship, etc.

By living in a car, you are giving up the foundations of the entire hierarchy, (shelter, safety, food, etc), and will be fighting an uphill battle to reach that higher state of self-actualization that is required to be able to work at a startup pace. I don't think it's a good idea to just live out of a car and fight the small battles every day because it will exhaust you.

I mean, let's be real. What if you get sick? What if it's 5am and you had a bad gyro the night before and you need to go real bad. Where are you going to go? Drive down to Page Mill and Hillview and do your business next to the horses?

If you can't afford the $600/month to rent a room in a house, even for 6 months, then you might want to consider saving up the money first and then getting a place or sublet for the summer. There are plenty of college kids that need sublets over the summer.

I'm split on being impressed with the intensity and turned off by the crazy-rays.

The bay area has many advantages, but it also depends on your specific vision and skills – not every business will get a net benefit from the bay's mix of benefits and stresses/costs.

In particular, the benefits of proximity to capital and deep (but pricey!) technical talent might not outweigh the logistical challenges of not knowing where you'll shower, make breakfast, and do laundry from day-to-day. Especially when your startup is a wake-up app.

I don't see how this is of any benefit other than self-promotion...which isn't a bad thing for an entrepreneur, but I'd be willing to bet that the time it takes to worry about all the other daily needs has a net negative impact on your success when weighed against the publicity etc you receive. I think if your goal is to be "famous" for living in your car in the blogosphere etc, its a good way to do it, but to help you actually produce/build something.....not so much. GL either way.

Do you have an actual idea for a startup, or just looking for a cofounder then going from there?

Did you click to the article? It says right there to the right of it: "I'm living from my car in Silicon Valley while I build my startup." And "startup" is linked to http://dailytoaster.com/

Oh god, yea I am sure this will go great. As if every single phone sold in the world doesn't have an alarm clock function.

I'm sorry but this represents everything that's wrong with the industry and why I sometimes find it hard to take startup people seriously. This sort of behavior, which is reckless and illogical (not to mention unsafe) should not be rewarded. It should be seen as a vain attempt at attention seeking. It's clear you have other options at making the move. If you have your heart set on being here, that's fine. Do the move in a controlled and logical way that makes sense. Just like you should be building your startup.

Instead of pulling stunts like living in a car, you need to wow us by creating an awesome product that people love, that solves a real-world problem. Investors, VCs, and other devs respect that. Not for being the startup world cliche poster child of living in your car in Palo Alto.

All through your article you rarely mentioned your product or business, or why you think it's so great you're willing to go to these lengths and accept this sort of risk that crosses the line of what most people would consider sane. You didn't say how much you believe in it, only a thinly-veiled illusion that somehow meeting the "right people" in SV will make the difference for you. If that's what your belief system is based upon, I'm sorry to say you're in for a rude awakening.

And for the people that say this "will be a great experience". That is rubbish. Moving a few 100 miles away to SV to build an iphone app out of your car is not great or cool. I know some people doing that at startups right now that get paid and have a nice apartment in SF and are miserable.

If you really want to have a great experience, spend it in a foreign country learning about another culture. Travel around Europe. Be homeless (coach surf) there. That, I assure you, will be a far better experience and leave you a much richer person than spending your days buried in Xcode in the back of your Honda Civic.

I seriously hope this is a joke. If you can't make it happen when you have a place to live in one of the largest cities on earth, you aren't going to make it in SF. Oh, I forgot, SF is "the center of the startup universe." That seems like a good reason to live out of your car.

If anything, it would make more sense to move OUT of SF to pursue a startup, since it is one of the most expensive cities in the US.

So you have to go to Sillicon Valley to build an alarm app? I really don't get it. Are there no computers where you live? Or no internet? I really feel like missing something big here.

This sounds like a dream for a hacker, but a single hacker. I am recently married, and it has been discussed to move up to San Fransisco, but we ended up realizing it wasn't the right time to move yet.

To leave your wife for a few months and live out of your car is not an admirable move. My thought is, once you get married then your spouse is your priority, everything else excluding family is second.

San Francisco might be start-up paradise, but by scanning through Craigslist, you will see tons of startups in the Los Angeles. I don't know if Kurt will see these comments, but I highly suggest he rethink this. By moving to San Francisco, he is leaving his biggest supporter: his wife.

I absolutely agree, Doug. My wife is completely on board and supportive of this. We reached this decision together. At this point, if I tried to stay in LA she wouldn't even let me.

Relationships are crazy man, I'm glad that you and your wife were able to work it out, and hopefully this crazy journey will be a success for you.

If you ever want to try to move the startup back to LA, let me know, I'm sure there are a few other hackers in the area that would love to start up a little monthly or bi-monthly meeting to bounce ideas and have hacking events.

Eh, your wife wants you 250 miles away? Does that really seem good?

Showers: Get a gym membership. Has the extra benefit of the occasional workout to stay healthy and sane.

24 Hour Fitness, for one. (cheap)

And make sure not to tell them why you're getting the gym membership. They tend to frown upon people using their facilities as their only shower.

Why? This should be ideal for them. Gym memberships are all about over-selling access to assets. If you're not going to use the machines but they collect the same monthly fees, they should be excited.

I read somewhere that fitness gyms are about cycling people through their facilities as fast as possible since you could never fit all the people that have memberships there at once. If anything I'd think they'd love to have a guy who pays full membership go there just for a shower.

How stupid is this idea ? You would live in your car just to be in the Silicon Valley ? A good idea and a good execution are what matters. Doesn't matter if you are hype and live in Palo Alto, go back to your apartment in LA and do some coding.

He seems to want to relocate to "silicon valley" (the Bay Area) and make it work long-term, from what I can tell, so while its a bit radical, it could work out for him, its hard to know when to make the jump. I think the case of a founder, who doesn't have a stable, solid income, it is even harder, personally I prefer the route of relocating for a job offer, putting in some time and then later, once some roots are put down, working on a startup, but since he already has one going, its probably not an option for him.

One suggestion on working spaces if you're traveling up to the city. There's a place called Noisebridge in the Mission that is more or less a free hacker lounge with a lot of creative folk in. The only caveat is that it tends to be noisy and sometimes it feels a little too hipster for my tastes.

To set the record straight: Noisebridge is NOT free. There's membership fees just like all the other hacker spaces, and there's rent and bills to pay to keep the space open and the lights on. Even if you're not a full dues paying member, you should be chipping in $5-10 into the donation bin every visit.

There's also been a lot of problems recently with homeless (mostly nonhackers) trying to live out of and take advantage of the space, without contributing anything back to the community.

That being said, please, please come to Noisebridge and work on your startup, or hack on something else exciting. There's lots of great tools and cool, knowledgable people there. Noisebridge has an ethic of radical inclusivity, so you're most definitely welcome to just show up and ask someone to show you around.

Just plan on being a contributing member of the community by hacking on something cool, chipping in for rent and bills, and by not sleeping/bathing/etc there.

While I won't argue with the fact that you should donate, I never felt any pressure to donate while I was taking classes there. I didn't even know there was a donation bin on-site until you mentioned it. To me, that was the cool thing about the place and made me want to donate more.

I admittedly haven't been there in about 9 months though and I never noticed a homeless problem while I was there. Everyone seemed to be a contributor. Have things changed?

You're right, it's not a high pressure donation situation (hacker dojo is _way_ more in your face about it). However, there are two donations bins right in front of you when you walk in the upstairs door into the space. I just really want to see Noisebridge continue on in all its glory, and making sure that people know that it's all membership/donation run is part of that.

Being on Mission St., it seems there's always been somewhat of a problem of Mission St. craziness colliding with Noisebridge awesomeness. However, from what I can see not being in the space a ton (I live in Palo Alto, and only make it up a couple times per month at best), there's been added pressure on the space in the past 6 months or so. Anecdotally, it seems word has gotten out in the homeless shelter community and Occupy community that Noisebridge is an awesome place to store your food/stuff, hang out on the free wifi, and sleep on the couches. Needless to say, that's not seen as excellent use of the space, and has been a challenge for the volunteer run, often introverted, consensus based organization that Noisebridge is.

Having said that, I've been up there several times recently to hack on hardware projects, and Noisebridge has been awesome, vibrant, and filled with great people working on cool stuff. It's just going through some challenges that would benefit from people helping promote it in the right light.

I've tried this before while reconnoitering new cities. I have a far better setup for stealthy, comfortable car-camping than this poor chap and I typically end up breaking down and staying at a hostel or finding a furnished craigslist/couchsurfing room anyway. The money you end up spending while loitering around coffee shops and burning through gas does not justify the savings over finding a cheap place to crash.

During some of my crazier and younger moments I've been on some trips where I would sleep in the car one night and stay in a motel others, it seems saving money is the issue, so maybe he'd be better off "cycling" and sleeping the car a few nights but intermixing it with staying in a motel / hostel others

The costs of short-term housing catches up quickly to the costs of an apartment. I did this for a couple months and I ended up paying the same monthly amount as my 1br apartment in the peninsula but I only had a room half of the month.

I kind of agree, but, lets see, my current rental in the Bay Area is about $60 per day if you calculate it based on the monthly rent. I just checked and a room at a motel 6 can be had for $55.99 a night this weekend in Sunnyvale, CA (Palo Alto doesn't have any Motel 6's apparently), so if say, every 3rd night, you stayed at a Motel 6, you would be saving based on my rent situation, however I am not sure how cheap one could get a long-term rental (apartment), however, it would only cost about $600 a month to stay at motel 6's every third night and I don't think you can even get a room in an apartment, with roommates for that cost in Silicon Valley

Dude, seriously, you don't want to be "that homeless guy". It's gonna be hard to shake off that reputation.

It worked for Colonel Sanders.

Agreed. Crashing on couches is way more legit - practically a SV tradition. Living out of your car on purpose is a little weird and it will attract attention from weirdos and repulse legit people. It's a fine way to get a foothold in the area, but he should look into sleeping around as soon as possible.

I feel sorry for his wife.

I don't think this is a silly idea. It's obviously a nice "PR" stunt and interesting enough to have made it to the HN front page, which should make sure that OP gets enough showering offers. I certainly would offer mine if I lived in the valley.

As I was reading this story, I thought to myself: I'd give this guy $100 if he was on Kickstarter or something.

Why? I don't mean to be rude, I'm genuinely curious. Would you give someone else $100 to, say, go to Burning Man and learn to fire-dance or are you actually excited about the cloud-based alarm clock?

Because I like startups, and he seems interesting and determined.

When I was just out of college, I met a couple of people in the Bay Area while on a trip. Being from a rather non-tech place in the south, I fell in love with the weather and the access to all the High Tech companies immediately.

I speculated to the guys I met on my trip, "I'd love to live here." They said I could crash on their floor for a bit while I found a job and my own place to stay. When I got home, I quit my job, ended my lease, packed up my small car with my stuff, and drove the 2k miles back to the Valley.

Within a few weeks, I had a contract programming job at a large company, a room to rent, and had begun one of the most exciting periods of my life as I worked in startups, started my own companies, and became steeped in the environment that makes entrepreneurship so very likely.

I guess what I'm saying is, don't hesitate to do this while you can. The Silicon Valley is THE PLACE for people in our industry.

Who wouldn't live in their car to get away from their wife for four months :)

The biggest flaw in his plan is that he has an amazing enough wife to let him chase his dreams...If he really appreciated the sacrifice she was making, he would never leave her for four months, or even four days.

I think the posters main goal here is to appear determined to investors. To get the message across to them that not only is he committed to making it work, he has a supportive family, and he is prepared to make every sacrifice to succeed.

Maybe this is a clever enough stunt to get into YC, or get some seed capital...After all, if I was an investor, I would be reassured by someone committed to do WHATEVER IT TAKES to succeed.

That being said, I think he has a serious problem appreciating the ancillary effects of his decisions, and doubt he anticipates how poor of a decision this really is, and how foolish it makes him appear to be.

I admire his gusto, and there is something to be said about breaking with the patterns of traditional living for even a short period of time. "The sleeper must awaken."

However, the downsides to vehicle dwelling are numerous (and well described in the comments here); It's a lifestyle probably incompatible with the focus needed for startup level productivity.

I had a similar (crazy) adventure once, based out of a minivan, and my experience was that vehicle living causes a fair amount of stress and doesn't let you easily recover from it. Vehicle sleep is not usually restful sleep, since issues of personal security and lawfulness are always on the edge of awareness. What a car lacks is the basic benefit of home: A place to just relax and have a bit of safe, secure quiet, and for god's sake not have to worry about where your laptop is at the moment.

Bottom line is that a vehicle is not a good place to personally "reset". And if you're planning on working super long days both because you're dedicated to a project and have no other place to go besides the office, that's a formula for burnout.

Most significantly though, he's going to have a devil of a time not being noticed as a potential target at night in his small sedan, which lacks non-obvious provisions for visual privacy or ventilation. A van or minivan would be much better; you can curtain the windows without drawing suspicion from your neighbors.

My minivan experiment lasted about a month. From there, I moved to a sailboat with all the attendant conveniences of a well equipped marina. During this time, I had a steady job and girlfriend (god bless her), but even with the relief of crashing at her place once in awhile, it was only a matter of months before my dreams of road-and-water-borne freedom transformed back to visions of walls and a roof of my own.

YMMV ;)

P.S. As others may have mentioned, AirBnB and CouchSurfing.com are infinitely better solutions to Kurt's stated purpose. But I suspect there will be no dissuading him. When the sea calls, the sea calls.

Many comments in this thread are so petty and naysaying, it's shameful.

Surely we can do better. How about suggesting specific places for this guy to park his car at night? That would be my biggest worry. I was going to nominate somewhere around here:

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Terminal+Boulevard+and+san+ant...

... but it's not (quite) in Palo Alto. It's beautiful there, though, and there might be something equivalent on the Palo Alto side (I haven't been).

A roundtrip drive from SF to PA would cost about $35 in fuel. 15 trips is $525. Might be cheaper (and a lot better) to just rent an apartment in Oakland.

Good Luck!

What? What kind of car takes $35 worth of fuel to drive that round trip? I drive a Chevy Aveo, costs $40 to fill up the tank, and I could probably make 3-4 round trips on a full tank.

Seriously.. I used to live in Phoenix, recently, and commuted probably 60 miles a day (roundtrip) and spent about that per week. Granted, SF to Palo Alto may be a bit further and gas is more expensive here but no way is it that much more to where its costing that much unless you have some huge gas guzzling truck, which he obviously doesn't, as you can see his car in the pic

On the one hand I feel excited for Kurt- such raw enthusiasm! This must be some kind of landmark for tech froth- that voluntarily becoming homeless in the pursuit of startup gold sounds like a good idea to some people.

This will sound mean but this is a really bad idea. A really, really terrible idea. Being homeless is not something to aspire to. You're due for a dope slap if you follow through with this, and I think life will oblige you in spades.

Seriously Kurt, not all that glitters is gold. There is nothing in Silicon Valley that will magically transform you into a super entrepreneur. There is no reason why you can't bootstrap your business until you can arrange enough cash to get a roof over your head.

I envy you. Not because you're doing what you're doing – but because of your 'invincibility' and 'top of the world' feeling. As long as you aren't burning bridges or on a irreversible course, there's no harm in exploration and trying out new ways to live.

I'm sure you'll have fun in the first week, but from where I stand, I think the better way is to crash at a fixed place so you don't have to spend the energy worrying about showering/survival and actually focus on the reason why you went to SF in the first place.

Don't get hyped up and waste too much energy on the novelty of living out of your car, blogging about it, and let it take over your focus.

Good luck!

I won't comment on my personal negative/positive take on this - doesn't much matter.

But the main issue I see, as others have stated, is the sheer amount of effort involved in merely surviving each day, every day. Not being assured a minimal level of safety, warmth, and shelter, is both physically and mentally draining. I don't know about you but I can't even work well if I wake up one hour earlier than usual.

Seem quite counterproductive from the "I'm doing this for my startup" point of view.

You're going to die; it'll get hot as hell in that car.

Good Luck though. It'll be interesting to hear how you get on.

I read a short snippet in the 1986 Whole Earth Catalogue about some guy doing digital nomadism on a three wheel bike.

I think it's here, but I can cope with the flash / pdf / UK wireless broadband dongle / "invisible" proxies to check.

(http://www.wholeearth.com/issue-electronic-edition.php?iss=1...)

Palo Alto stays pretty cool most of the year, certainly it is cool enough now to not cook in the car

Can't imagine how I forgot about that: http://www.nomadness.com You can find his whole story from the bike days to today here.

So he's taking on two huge challenges at once. I mean, I hope it works out, but I seriously doubt it.

Something I've pondered about doing is eventually buying and living out of a motor home. No property taxes, easy (in some areas) to park, and you can pickup and drive away from impending natural disasters (e.g. hurricane). Park near a library or Starbucks to borrow WiFi, or get a cell-phone plan.

Downsides include cost of fuel with low fuel economy, difficulty manuvering and finding parking in dense locations, and potential cost of RV hookups. Plus an RV is a vehicle which comes with its own maintenance issues, and I'd imagine insurance is likely high relative to a car. They are expensive, $200,000+ for something that's large enough to comfortably live in.

Does anyone have experience doing this, or know someone who has? Upsides? Downsides?

Funny you say that because my friend has done just that. He's been travelling for ~3 years around Europe in a motorhome while working on his startup. You can check out his travel blog here http://technomadics.net/. He makes iPhone/iPad apps which you can see here http://atastypixel.com/.

There is no reason to buy a new motorhome. The ones the size of a bus can be found used for $12,000 needing just a little work.

I haven't done it, but my inlaws lived in their motorhome for about 9 months while building a house. They just parked it on the lot away from all the construction. That solved all the problems like parking, power hookup, laundry (close enough to family to use their washers).

I couldn't see myself living in one for any length of time, but at the same time, one of my "life dreams" is to live on a boat for a few years. Same difference :-)

Its a shame that he doesn't think Los Angeles is good for the startups..really stupid move.

I agree, it's a bigger population and Craigslist has tons of ads for startups that are growing and need more assistance. What he is doing can be done from his computer, and he doesn't need to leave his wife.

You would think he was from another tech backward nation....not LA???

I actually did this. In 1999, I lived Monday through Friday sleeping on a mattress in the bed of my truck under a camper shell in the parking lot of the startup I worked at. I would drive down to Orange County on Friday nights and come back up early Monday morning. I rented a really cool house in Orange county in a great place near the beach with 3 buddies... and I didn't want to give that up... But I wanted to work in the Valley... After about 6 months, I was fed up and I got an apartment and moved to the Valley full time.

I knew of several groups of people who lived in San Francisco but pooled together for crappy commuter apartments in Silicon Valley where they could sometimes sleep during the week after work. It was usually just a sleeping bag per person. Maybe you can find something like that, it'd be a lot easier. Their rent was usually 200 or so per person.

I respect the grind and the willingness to sacrifice comfort to try your hand at this startup game. Good luck to this guy.

What about doing laundry? Washing your socks in a nearby toilet on a gas station might seem a bit shady to some people.

There's usually laundromats in every city.

Sounds like you've never lived in a big city before -- many "real" apartments lack laundry machines too. You actually have to take your laundry and go to a laundromat across the street. Painful right?

bring a rain jacket :) its been raining non-stop all week, having lived off and on in northern California for much of my life honestly I would recommend waiting another 2-3 weeks as thats usually when the "dry season" starts for sure so you don't have to worry about rain, etc when doing something like this

Check out this guy that lives in an RV and loves it: http://tynan.com/living-in-a-small-rv-introduction

He's got the perfect sized RV that fits into standard sized parking spaces. It must be pretty nice being rent free.

Trade to a honda element, and throw an ecamper conversion on it. It'll be much more comfortable.

Interesting, same as http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3709260 but more up votes.

He even links to a Hacker news discussion in his blog posting.

Wondering why this didn't get flagged as a dupe.

Tumblr posts don't care about the last URL portion, it's there only for presentation.

blog.com/post/[id]/[title]

where [title] is completely ignored and can be anything. For example: http://kurtvarner.com/post/19347794553/random-title-no-relev... will link to the post. The original title his post had was "A Man, a Car and His Startup" which became "a-man-a-car-and-his-startup" but the URL was changed to "man-car-startup" so now when submitted it's a "different" URL but Tumblr treats them as the same.

Ah thanks, that was the mystery I was wondering about.

For the record, the poster of this is not Kurt. I am Kurt. I have no idea who the poster is and why it was double posted from yesterday.

"PariSoma is in San Francisco and will cost $295 for full-time."

Why is PariSoma so expensive? That's triple the cost of Hacker Dojo. You can rent an apartment room in the valley for < $200 more.

SF rent is probably more than 3x rent of the bay. I believe the Dojo rent is around $1 per sqft -- mostly because that area is actually zoned as light industrial.

Keep your mattress and supplies in the car out of sight, there are slime things that make their way up and down market street that would smash all your windows for just the sleeping bag or mattress.

Getting smashed and grabbed is a very likely thing to happen if you have anything in the car at all.

this guy really believes in people waking up on time enough that hes going to live in his car for a summer?

This dude is completely insane but I admire his total steadfast belief. If he manages to one day apply that intensity of conviction to actual real information, he'll probably do very well.

Kurt, if you're reading this, for the love of God, stay the fuck away from east Palo Alto. At least look it up on Wikipedia. You'll read about an anti-gang-crime task force which included 500 FBI agents and plenty of other law enforcement people. You'll also discover the city held the highest murder rate in the country back in 1992. It's lost its champion status since then, but it's still in the game. Point being that it is NOT the same as regular Palo Alto.

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