Amber’s Tips for Neighborhood Dating in San Francisco

When my husband Jacob and I first knew we were relocating to San Francisco, we of course needed to choose a neighborhood to live in. Finding a place to live in San Francisco was not just about finding the right home—the neighborhood was also of the utmost importance to us. 

That's where neighborhood dating comes in! 

What is Neighborhood Dating?

Neighborhood dating is the process of trying out different neighborhoods. As a real estate agent, I've been advising my clients to "try on" neighborhoods for years. So many buyers come to me with their heart set on a specific neighborhood, only to fall in love with somewhere completely different once they get out and actually spend time there. The house matters, but your lifestyle is going to largely be impacted by your neighborhood!

No matter what city you’re moving to—or even if you’re just moving somewhere new within the city you already live in—you can put these neighborhood dating tips to use. I’m also sharing specific examples of what Jacob and I did to explore San Francisco and choose the neighborhood that was juuuuuust right for us. 

How to Find the Best Neighborhood for You in San Francisco

The more neighborhoods you explore, the more confident you’ll be when it’s time to make an offer on a home. So how do you go about “dating” a neighborhood in San Francisco? Here are my best tips! 

Reflect on your current lifestyle. 

Park hangs with Cooper are a very important part of our week

What do you do in your daily life TODAY in your current town? What do you love about your lifestyle and would like to continue, and what are the things you’d like to change? 

When my husband and I made our part-time move to San Francisco, we decided that we wanted to prioritize walking more. In Seattle, we spend a lot of time in our cars, especially me since I’m a real estate agent and always zipping around and across the city. It’s not a bad thing, it’s just the nature of my work, but we took the opportunity to embrace exploring on foot more. 

What activities do you do on a weekly or seasonal basis? 

For Seattlites, maybe you love boating in the summer and snowboarding in the winter. This might mean you want to live close to a marina or in a neighborhood just out of the city that makes it easy to hop over to the slopes. 

In San Francisco, many people are very active. If you like to go running, is it important to you to be in an area where there are running groups, or a big park ideal for runs? Do you want to be down the street from a tennis court, or a specific type of workout studio? 

I personally love doing pilates, so in SF I tried about 5 of the major studios after doing some online research. Like I physically went and tried them out. If you’re going to spend a significant amount of time at a place, it’s worth taking the time to do this. 

What do you like to do when you go out? 

I’m always on the hunt for the best gluten free restaurants in a new city!

Maybe you’re in your clubbing phase, or you and your friends love brewery hopping, or you love being close to tons of restaurants where you don’t need reservations on the weekends. Is it important that you can walk to these places, or are you cool with taking a bus to another neighborhood? Depending on your lifestyle, your ease of access to these types of things can really affect your social life! 

Do you like being super close to a grocery store? 

When my husband and I were deciding on which neighborhood to move to in San Francisco, it was really important to me to be close to a grocery store that I liked. I wanted to be able to easily walk there and not have to worry about a car or transit. 

There were other conveniences I wanted to be able to walk to as well—for example, I wanted to be able to take packages to Fedex on foot. 

Visit a few coffee shops. 

I always love people watching at a local coffee shop

If you’re someone who likes to grab coffee out or work on your laptop in a cafe, being close to a coffee shop that you frequent might be important. Spend time at different coffee shops with different vibes. Some might have a lot of students, some might have a more lively social atmosphere, some might be quiet where people like to focus and work. You can also learn a lot about a neighborhood from the coffee shops! 

If you have kids, consider the amenities you want to be close to. 

Is it important to you to be able to walk down the street on a sidewalk to a park with a playground? Do you want to be walking distance to a community center with a pool? What activities will your kids do if the weather isn’t great? This type of thing can greatly impact your lifestyle and quality life, so this is definitely one of the most important factors if you have kiddos. 

What will your commute be like? 

In my opinion, you should do more than just check out Google maps. I really recommend actually taking transit to and from where you need to go, or renting a car and driving your commute… during the time of day you’ll need to get around. A 10-minute drive in the middle of the day might turn into a 35-minute drive during rush hour. 

At the same time, if you think you want to have a car in San Francisco, rent one and drive it around during your visit. I personally opted not to have a car in San Francisco (whereas I have one in Seattle). It’s more expensive to have a car in SF, parking is really hard, and the city is so walkable! 

Stroll through the neighborhood. 

When my husband and I were deciding where to live in San Francisco, I literally walked 20+ miles a day for 4 days to get a feel for all of the different SF neighborhoods. Not everyone needs to scour the city that much of course, but as a realtor you know I like to do my research! I wanted to form my own opinions about each place, and this was important for my own mental wellbeing and my family. 

I recommend doing something similar in neighborhoods you’re seriously considering moving to. This will also help you discover if a neighborhood is as pedestrian friendly as you’d like, and if the hills are manageable (SF is a city of hills!). If you like to walk your dog, try that out, too! 

When people ask me if a neighborhood is safe, one of the best pieces of advice I have is to just go walk around a neighborhood and see how you feel. The reality is that everyone has a different idea of “safe” and what level of safety they’re comfortable with. Visit places in person to make your own opinions. You can also always pull date on crime rates however I encourage you to pull data from other places you’ve lived so you have a baseline understanding of what these stats feel like in the real world.

There’s always a learning curve to living in a new place, so these things will take some adjusting. You don’t want to overwhelm yourself too much, but approach this experience through a lens of growth! 

If you’re moving to San Francisco and want to find juuuust the right neighborhood for your lifestyle and goals, reach out and I’d be happy to make some recommendations.