Ask HN: Which Small U.S City Is Best Suited For Bootstrapping A Startup?
Published in 2012, this chronicle by @npguy details the mechanics of building a profitable, self-funded business without venture backing.
The community focused on B2B customer acquisition channels, cold email vs SEO distribution, and balancing full-time employment with side-project development.
Some business plans will benifit a lot from being in a specific location; however if you currently live in a city with friends, family, and maybe a SO with a job starting right where you are until at least you hit MVP isn't a bad idea.
I'm personallly biased towards lower cost areas, the same funding slug buys you more runway. Being in michigan I'd say Detroit ISN'T on my top list of cities to start in, I find Ann Arbor to be more expensive but offers better quality of life and is right next to a major univeristy. Grand Rapids is cheaper, and has StartGarden.com that is trying to build a whole ecosystem.
Probably Detroit or its peripheral cities (there are some nice ones, Birmingham, Royal Oak and more). Dan Gilbert (Quicken Loans) is trying to revive downtown and investing in new startups. Also it's only 45min away from Ann Arbor which is an awesome city.
You can rent an apartment for the cost of monthly parking in SF :)
Pittsburgh has a nice combination of low-cost housing, good universities, and a moderately sized tech industry (boosted by the Google satellite). Nice nature in the area as well.
Philadelphia is quite good as well. Big city, in a super expensive area (northeast) but quite affordable compared to NYC/Boston/DC.
based on cost of living, and then other factors.