Alicornutopia

Can vouch for Alicorn! I'm definitely going on the "This is The Dream, but cannot make commitments five years in advance" list--I would love to contribute financially but I have no idea if that's going to be feasible; I'm going to start my senior year of undergrad in the fall and then getting my Masters should take two years after that but probably I am not going to be super financially stable after two years out of school, even if I find a librarian job right away, which is a) not guaranteed and b) might well constitute a reason to continue living somewhere other than where the baugruppe is set up, unless it was in the area already, which is not the likeliest thing ever given that I don't currently live there but who knows, I can at least try.

But I super want to do this thing.

There was a nontrivial chance my first postdoc would be in Berkeley, but instead it's going to be in Vancouver. Ask me again in 3 years!

I am very interested! Right now, I am attending college in a different state for the next 3-6 years, at least. A lot of whether I can do it would depend on what jobs are like and where I can get one, and whether an employer decides they really want me to do more college. There's a chance that I'd be able to get a summer internship in the area before then, but I'm not sure how large it is. I've heard the Bay Area gets really expensive - about how much would be "mortgage contribution" magnitude?

Testimonial: I have only visited Alicorn the once, and didn't live there, but she was a very nice host and everyone there also seemed cool, including both the people who were living there and just visiting.

The ballpark figure of how much we need total is on the order of nineteen million dollars across everybody and we need most of it to happen before there is a place to move into and there is risk of place not happening. We are at a very preliminary stage now.

How long before?

I'm not on a committee that has to do math, my committee is "friendship and ponies", but if you want me to ask for what we have on timeline I can.

Yeah that would be useful, if you could.

Put me down on that same Maybe list. I think I’m more likely to be able to but less likely to want to than some other people here (there are advantages to not living with people), but five years is a long time and who knows where either value will be then?

I am on the Almost Certainly Not list (unless I get, like, a script doctor job or something in Cali that immediately catapults me out of my customer service helljob and into homeownership territory) but it sounds fun and I wish all the best.

Also, atheistcanuck's conundrum is one degree adjacent to what I do all day, so that's kind of weirdly amusing for me. (Dubious advice by virtue of working five feet away from people who actually do handle your exact problem all day: California may or may not take six goddam months to grant you a license. So there's that.)

I am told that while we are asking people for two-digit commitment-effect money (which will be translated into a discount on a house) Real Soon Now and encouraging people to find out how much mortgage they can qualify for Now Now Now, actually getting a mortgage will be post-existence-of-houses.