Frugal SF #
Most frugality advice is worthless because it is generic. “Skip the latte” saves you four dollars. Rent control saves me twenty-five thousand dollars a year. The difference between those two is the entire point of this section.
Everything here is something I actually do, with the real numbers attached. San Francisco is expensive, but a lot of that expense is optional and paid by people who never questioned the default.
Housing, the biggest lever by far #
- San Francisco rent control, from someone paying $1,680 for a $3,800 apartment
- Signing a Lease in SF: Deposits, Traps, and the Money You Get Back, including the deposit interest your landlord probably owes you
Nothing else on this page comes close to the first one. Get it right and the rest is detail.
Getting around #
- The Real Math on Going Car-Free in San Francisco, worth roughly ten thousand dollars a year
- Muni, BART, and Clipper: Which Pass Actually Saves You Money, and the 31-ride break-even nobody checks
- The $2.05 Way to SFO: Take SamTrans, Not BART
- Cheap Road Trips Out of San Francisco
- How to Beat Airline Bag Fees
Food and groceries #
- Grocery Shopping in SF Chinatown: The Real Price Difference, a third to a half of supermarket prices on the same produce
- Is Costco Worth It If You Live in San Francisco?
- How to Eat for Free in San Francisco: the Tech Event Circuit
Home cooking is the other half of the food answer, and it has its own section.
Bills you assumed were fixed #
- Cutting Your PG&E, Internet, and Phone Bills in SF, about $1,740 a year from three phone calls and a form
- PG&E’s New $24 Fixed Charge Is a Tax on Using Less, and why SF apartments are the worst-hit households in the state
- Cheap Dental, Vision, and Healthcare in San Francisco
Setting up your life for cheap #
- Cut Your Own Hair: A $25 Clipper Pays for Itself
- How to Furnish an SF Apartment for Almost Nothing
- Staying Fit in San Francisco Without a $200 Gym
- Free Things to Do in San Francisco That Are Actually Worth It
Buy it once #
Subscriptions and tools #
- Cancel Netflix: Your Library Streams Movies for Free
- Stop Paying $40 a Month for AI: Use GLM and Qwen Instead
- How I Host Everything for Free: The Best Free Tiers for Builders
Making money on the side #
The other half #
Spending less has a hard floor. Once your fixed costs are low there is nothing left to cut, and the question becomes what to do with the difference and how to earn more of it. That is Money, starting with the retirement arithmetic and careers that pay well without grad school.