For family members, clean street and school districts are important. For myself, RD and CC are less important than this one.

Q: For every 100 contract jobs in NYC, how many are there in JC?
A: JC 20-30; Alan Shi felt 30. He felt there are more in JC than downtown Manhattan.

Q: other parts of NJ?
A: below 2.

Q: I’m more suitable for contract jobs, but still .. For every 100 financial tech jobs in NYC, how many are there in JC?
A: JC 15-25, since perm jobs are slightly less popular in JC than big bank contract jobs.

If there are 100 financial IT positions in city AA and BB, but AA has just one employer while BB has 3, then I prefer BB. Reason is subtle — As a contractor, I need choices. If I end my contract with one client I usually need to change client, rather than change department. Therefore, I need to identify the “clusters of financial IT contract employers”. NYC and JC are the 2 biggest clusters. In contrast, I guess Greenwich has mostly buy-side companies, who aren’t keen about contractors!  This is an example of a unique preference.

A typical unique buyer preference — low floor. Most buyers dislike low floor but I prefer it. So it’s plain stupid to follow herd instinct and pay a premium for a high floor I don’t like.

Let me restate our unique preference — closer to contract job clusters by rail.

Most buyers don’t mind 5 minutes additional commute by rail, so Bishan/AMK sells more than some parts of Toa Payoh, but I do care about those 5 minutes. See my post on commute eating into leisure time.

I don’t enjoy driving to work (jams, parking, road rage, stress, unable to read …), so train stations to NYC/JC are my targets. I have an impression that Queens/Brooklyn (including 8th Ave) are run-down and dirty.