Portland has most of the benefits of San Francisco with all of the drawbacks of Seattle. As gray as SF is, I don't understand how anybody lives in Seattle or Portland without committing suicide from the lack of sun.
If rent control went away along with the Ellis act, in 5 years the average rent in San Francisco would be 15% lower than what it is today. Rent control very severely distorts both the rental and the real estate market in many direct and indirect ways.
I stand by this statement. There is one pocket of the Mission around 16th & Mission that's really diverse, and then say between Potrero and Bryant is mostly hisanic between 14th & Cesar Chavez
The rest of the Mission is pretty freaking white, especially since Bernal tends to be grouped into the same "Mission" umbrella.
By diversity, do you mean "lots of people of different races and ethnic heritages live here in harmony" or do you mean "lots of ethnic food to eat"? Because I would call hijinx on the former, this city is pretty white, at least all of SOMA/FiDi, North Beach, NOPA, The Sunset, most of the Mission, most of the excelsior, and at least 70% of every other neighborhood is white. Having been here a decade I feel this city is far more segregated than others I've lived in, and I've lived in 7 different neighborhoods now.
I did, and yes I hate the climate. I've stayed for a decade, and threatened to move back to New York quite consistently. There's nowhere else in the country to live for tech though, everything else really feels like amateur hour.