I Lived in Car While Working at Google to Save Money; Sort of Worth It

“I have family in the Bay Area, so I can work locally,” I told the hiring manager during an interview at Google.

I didn’t, but I lied because I was living in Santa Barbara at the time, roughly 300 miles away from Google’s main headquarters in Mountain View, California. I knew going into the interview that I’d need to work on-site, but I really wanted the position.

It was 2019, the AI field was growing, and this contract role at Google seemed like my way in. I told myself that if I could just land the job, I’d figure out my living situation later.

Fortunately, I got hired. Unfortunately, figuring out where I could live and how I’d afford it wasn’t so simple.

In order to make the opportunity happen, I had to get creative

Getting an apartment closer to the Google offices didn’t feel like an option for me. First of all, I found out I wouldn’t be able to break my lease in Santa Barbara, which still had about four months left.

Plus, rent in the Bay Area felt sky-high. At the time, the median cost of a one-bedroom apartment in San Francisco was $3,600 a month. Santa Barbara wasn’t cheap either, and I wasn’t making enough money to pay for two rents at the same time.

The gears in my brain began turning, though. Did I really need a whole apartment? At the time, Google offered free food, a gym, showers, and even laundry on its campus.

With access to all these amenities, maybe I could just live in a car.

The only issue? I used a motorcycle to get around at the time. So, I had less than a month to find a new vehicle.

I sold my bike and prepared to make a 2005 Volvo my home

Over the next few weeks, I scanned Craigslist for a used car and settled on a 2005 Volvo for a reasonable price. I sold my motorcycle to help cover the costs, and decided I’d live in the car until my Santa Barbara lease ended.

Related stories

To prep the space, I made cardboard window inserts with black felt on one side and thermal insulation on the other. This kept my windows blacked out so I could sleep without looking too suspicious.

It also helped keep some of the heat inside the vehicle. I even bought a sleeping pad to insulate myself from the floor.

For the first two weeks of work, I parked in the basement garage of the Google office, and my commute was amazing: 30 seconds. However, things weren’t perfect.

Despite my makeshift insulation, the car still got cold. I’d grown tired of waking up shivering at 5 a.m., so I started going to work early.

I’d go to the gym with my bag filled with clothes, take a shower, and then throw in a load of laundry since there were washers and dryers on campus. After a few meetings, I took the clothes out of the dryer, folded them, and then returned to my car to put them in the trunk next to my makeshift bed.

Because I wanted to minimize the time I spent in my car after work, I’d hang out at my desk watching YouTube videos until 11 p.m. I think my manager assumed I was either very dedicated or avoiding something at home. Either way, he didn’t ask.

Every once in a while, I’d drive 300 miles to my Santa Barbara apartment to get some sleep on a real bed for a weekend and rotate which clothes I kept in my car so I wasn’t wearing the same outfits every day.

Soon, I found out I wasn’t the only Google employee living in my car

About two weeks in, I woke up to the sound of security knocking on my door and saw a pair of flashlights searching through the curtain.

They saw my sleeping setup and asked for ID. The guard seemed apologetic as he told me that he couldn’t let me sleep here.

Luckily, I found a new spot to park on campus near some RVs. The space seemed to be situated between two security zones, so I hoped I wouldn’t be bothered, and I felt safe knowing others were around.

By this point, I only needed to make this setup work for a little over two more months until my lease was up. Once it was, I felt like I would have more options.

As the lease was coming to an end, I convinced my manager to transfer me to the New York City office. Though rent wasn’t much cheaper than it was in the Bay Area, I wouldn’t need a car, so I could sell my Volvo and use that money to cover my security deposit for a studio apartment in Manhattan.

On my last day as a car dweller, I stayed late at the office and struck up a conversation with a teammate. I told him I had a confession to make: The only reason I was always staying late at the office was because I had been sleeping in a car for the last three months.

His eyes lit up, and he asked if I was sleeping in a Volvo. Confused, I nodded yes. He then told me he was living in the RV that was always parked next to me. We were neighbors.

I learned we weren’t the only ones living in cars on the Google campus, either. He invited me to a monthly meetup happening that night, where I met about a dozen other employees who were living in their cars.

We shared stories about which gyms were the best in the mornings and which cafés offered the best dinners late at night. I realized then that when I saw people coming into the office early and leaving late, I might have been looking at a fellow car dweller.

I’m glad I was able to break into the field, but I wish I had other options

Looking back at the experience, I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, the role helped kick-start my career in tech, and I did whatever it took to get it.

On the other hand, it was eye-opening to meet so many people who were living in their cars while working for a major tech company. It feels like a testament to just how expensive it is to live in this part of California.

The cost of living in the Bay Area is higher than the national average, making it difficult for anyone working in the area to have a comfortable living situation without commanding an astonishing salary or enduring a painfully long commute.

Even if I weren’t paying for my apartment in Santa Barbara, it might’ve been difficult for me to get by.

I don’t regret spending a few months living in my car to have the job I wanted, and I’m grateful that my arrangement was only temporary.

Plus, at the end of the day, I was still fortunate enough to have an apartment where I could return and store my belongings. However, I wish it hadn’t been a necessary part of my career growth. I empathize with anyone in the same position.

Google did not respond to a request for comment.