Some policy developments and other initiatives, however, suggest that solutions to the problem are possible. In June, the California Supreme Court upheld a City of San Jose law requiring that developers price 15 percent of new units affordably for people earning 110 percent or less of the neighborhood’s median income. Similar laws—as well as fees for building new housing, which are then used to support affordable housing—are on the books in nearby towns as well, though teachers often make too much to qualify for official affordable-housing benefits. And earlier this month, SV@Home, a new advocacy organization with backing from Google and LinkedIn, opened its doors with the objective of expanding affordable housing in Silicon Valley.

But these latest developments have focused on the affordability of housing more generally—not for teachers or other community workers specifically. Teachers, for the most part, must find living solutions on their own.

Some older teachers, like the Cupertino teachers union’s Villafana, have stable rentals with landlords who are not out to make a large profit. Younger teachers who rent in the towns in which they teach often live with multiple roommates, but that situation that can become less appealing as the educators reach their 30s and start to look at having family or simply gaining some more personal space. Meanwhile, those who want to own but didn’t buy into the market at least 15 years ago are often left to buy condos on the edges of the Bay Area or in Santa Cruz on the coast, which is actually a less expensive place to live. Still other teachers end up marrying a partner with a job in tech that makes up for the teacher’s smaller salary.

Some teacher-specific solutions do exist. The San Francisco Teacher Next Door program provides loans of up to $20,000 towards a down payment to qualified teachers employed by the San Francisco Unified School District. That’s about 10 percent of the amount needed for a down payment in San Francisco. And nationally, the federal Good Neighbor program offers 50 percent discounts to teachers, police, and firefighters on homes it owns. But there isn’t a single house in Silicon Valley on the program’s list of discounted homes.

Perhaps one of the most straightforward solutions to the lack of affordable housing for teachers in the Valley is the “Casa del Maestro,” or “House of the Teacher” apartment complex in the city of Santa Clara. Over the past 15 years, 70 one- and two-bedroom units have been built on district-owned land and rented only to new Santa Clara public-school teachers at reduced prices ranging from $1,110 to $1,805 a month for a maximum period of seven years.

The second-grade teacher Megan Winslow, 33, said she benefitted from that program. In her years living in Santa Clara’s teacher housing she was able to put money away for retirement, build a savings account, and travel a bit in the summer. Now that she’s moved into the real-life rental market, she’s had to stop putting money into retirement entirely. Money for savings and travel have become limited, too, although she still finds cash to put into her classroom or to help her students. (She says she once covered a few nights in a motel for a student’s family whose homeless shelter was temporarily shut down.) Winslow now pays half of the $2,515 monthly rent, plus utilities, on a two-bedroom apartment she shares with a roommate.