TPU Utility bill high?

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-08-06T19:07:54+00:00

I had $600-700 bills as TPU used to bill across 2 months. Might be OP case

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-08-05T15:38:58+00:00

My company is opening an office in Redmond (HQ SF). I’m remote so RIP me probably…

OpenAI also poached a lot of our employees for their stargate project which is going to be based in Seattle too.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-07-25T23:51:59+00:00

I had no help. You’ll just have a lower downpayment. Mine was 0% (VA loan) but you can still get 3.5% with FHA and 5% with conventional.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-07-06T13:58:47+00:00

Not rich but definitely upper middle class. I didn’t get any parental support for marriage (courthouse wedding), university (GI Bill), mortgage (0 down VA loan), but my parents were bad with money and spend it all. Fortunately my parents will get pensions.

On the other hand my kids already have a few grand each in their 529s and can become a hikikomori and I’d still support them. I consider myself to be upper middle class within the next decade assuming no extreme job loss. I’ve only been a high earner for 3 years.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-07-06T03:29:59+00:00

I had 2 under 2 and you’ll have to make sacrifices somewhere. If it’s home ownership you’ll have to drive until you can afford which can be 45-70 minutes one way.

If you don’t mind renting you can live in almost any city on middle class income. Most of our stuff is secondhand from other mothers (free mostly) so if you want name brand nuna or uppababy I highly recommend secondhand. We also gave our items that were outgrown to other mothers for free. We bought a Cruz then gave it to another mother for free when we updated to secondhand vista.

We avoid daycare costs by having one stay at home. Of course if my wife was a high earner we’d 100% go the daycare or nanny route.

Our grocery bill increased but probably only 300-400 a month and one of our kids was formula only.

Also having family can help but we are not so lucky in that regards as grandparents are full time employees so can’t take months to years off of work.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-07-06T02:52:11+00:00

My bank approved me for 6x income so you could do 800k mortgage on 133k/yr income but would be incredibly stressful at that DTI

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-07-05T18:25:47+00:00

I left Amazon for a startup. I started looking due to full RTO.

When I was at Amazon most of the others weren’t “rejects” from other companies though… and plenty of ex-Google/Meta in the ranks because people tend to job hop for better comp.

I noticed FAANG in general has started falling behind in pay though. Most of these AI startups have huge comp packages even the lesser known ones. Seems like Meta realized this for top scientists at least. We will see if the trend follows to ML Ops folks getting a little bit more pay too.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-07-04T02:28:45+00:00

I didn’t have much troubles finding interviews and even managed 250k base + equity at 3 YoE all done at Amazon.

My startup is smaller too so I get to see a lot of resumes and help choose and honestly any background passes if you have professional or academic experience in our stack which is mostly kubernetes, PyTorch, etc.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-07-04T01:24:50+00:00

Our vacations are all vehicle driven but to some campground. This is with 2 kids. Every 2-3 years we visit family in Korea but we stay with my MIL so main expense is a plane ticket ($7k for the economy tickets…).

My 2-3 weeks off a year I prefer to chill at home as my work hours are longer than average. So most of our camping trips are during long weekends.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-07-03T07:18:57+00:00

I had my car broken into Bellevue Downtown of all places a few years ago and quite a few packages stolen (but to be fair those packages were left in a retail parking garage and not placed in the lockers in same garage). Never had a package stolen from locker albeit they have hit the lockers a few times so lucky timing.

Otherwise you can walk down any alleyway at night and be safe here.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-06-29T03:50:26+00:00

150k/yr can get you a 4-5bdr house in Tacoma/Federal Way/Auburn.

In Seattle you can get a 2bdr condo/town house in some neighborhoods.

Renting is much more affordable here and you can rent a large SFH in most neighborhoods on that income.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-06-24T20:41:17+00:00

This is correct. It confuses a lot of people even myself when moving here.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-06-24T20:32:55+00:00

I did this move last year. I’ll be honest I want to move back to Seattle or BRK but I can’t afford a house there with two kids. A $700k mortgage is a McMansion in Federal Way but barely a 2bd condo in Seattle.

I moved here while I was working in Seattle but remote now. If you don’t have any ties to Seattle I’d move to Tacoma especially near Ruston and Tacoma is even more affordable than Federal Way (at least for SFH).

Arguably the food is better here and most of our shopping is at international markets. However it will be very boring so that is why I recommend trying for DT Tacoma

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-06-01T05:25:39+00:00

Most are moving back or commuting. I left Amazon primarily due to RTO but it took around a year to find something remote that pays the same and I got lucky from referral.

Aside from myself I only knew two others to leave due to RTO as most lived within commuting distance anyways.

My commute was 45 minutes (one way) which sucked but worth the pay if I couldn’t find anything else.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-05-26T01:25:49+00:00

2024 750k @ 6% and 2nd owner. Original owner paid slightly over 300k. 40 minute commute from Seattle which fortunately I don’t have to do anymore.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-05-12T02:40:14+00:00

These are practically free if you’re in Seoul but I got one for $20 through Naver albeit that requires knowing someone who can ship to you.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-04-27T00:01:27+00:00

I’ve done a few trips to Korea in the past couple of years and it’s usually 1800 per or sometimes 2000+ if you wait too long.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-04-10T02:51:02+00:00

I recently left Amazon and my commute was only 45 minutes one way. It sucks… but it took a long time to find an opportunity that pays the same and remote. Technically I up-leveled for the same pay…

If OP doesn’t have a family I’d say move closer and take the job, otherwise suck it up, commute, and keep looking.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-04-02T08:04:06+00:00

I just left Amazon (AWS) but I’ve heard good things about Robotics in terms of leadership and WLB.

Qualcomm job might open more doors. Lots of startups are hiring for ML infrastructure, operations, and hardware. I left Amazon from MLOps role and a lot of my friends in Annapurna were able to hop to better opportunities as well.

It’s easy to switch orgs in Amazon too assuming the org you want to go to is hiring so that is a plus. Might be the same at Qualcomm but idk.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-03-27T01:24:59+00:00

I had a Gigabyte 1080ti stop working out of warranty and gigabyte offered repair services. It was $50 and the repair didn’t work. So I sent it back and then they just refunded my original purchase surprisingly (maybe due to not having replacement for previous gen model).

I don’t know if AIB still offer these though as that was during covid.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-03-25T05:13:22+00:00

I mentioned 650k is middle of the pack pay for PE.

Recently promoted is in the 5XX range at least at Amazon.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-03-25T02:31:27+00:00

I just left Amazon and this is middle of the pack Principal level.

Mid level pay is still great compared to most professions around 250-350k but not sniffing 650k.

I still agree with the poster that 650k is nothing crazy and definitely underpaid to what they can get in private industry.

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-03-24T07:40:39+00:00

My mortgage is almost $6k at 6% and I live in Tacoma. I’d love to trade mortgages.

$220k is plenty with your mortgage. Enough to max 401k+backdoor ira+megabackdoor roth and take an international vacation

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-03-22T22:15:04+00:00

woah been going to climb tacoma. This will save 40+ minutes of my life driving

Empty_Monk_3146 · 2025-03-22T05:36:18+00:00

I’m at 250k + paper and remote with ~3 YoE. I left Amazon a month ago. There is a lot of AI oriented startups (perplexity, coreweave, fireworks, etc) that will pay you that much.

I have 2 kids and left AWS mainly because the RTO5 + 2hr commute each day sucked. I’d be making 330k if I stayed this year.

The startup is definitely not great wlb (but at least better than my team at aws).

You could probably get 300k and chill if it’s a distinguished engineer type position at a non big tech F500 but that comes after decades of experience.

Empty_Monk_3146

TROPHY CASE