Technically, you only need to be there from June-August.
That said: speaking as a cofounder of a brand new company, and despite being corrosively skeptical of YC in the past, if it weren't for the SFBA prereq, we'd apply. You're right, it's annoying!
YC isn't just about credentials. A significant part of the value is concentrated in the Tuesday dinners and in-person office hours. Even if YC did accept remote companies, the value of the program would be greatly diminished if you didn't move to the bay.
And that's to say nothing of investors, over 70% of whom are concentrated in the valley.
Plus, there's also probably some signal value here for YC. If you're not sufficiently committed to be willing to move somewhere else for 3-4 months, you may not be that serious about your startup. It's not the strongest signal, but its impact is probably non-trivial.
> If you're not sufficiently committed to be willing to move somewhere else for 3-4 months,
... Then you might be older than 30. I don't blame YC at all; I'd do it the same way. However, lots of the industry's demands for evidence of passion/interest/excitement are things only applicable to young people.
A non-trivial number of YC founders are >30, married, have kids, and don't live in the Bay when they apply. It's not that big of a hurdle.
Consider how many people with similar commitments (kids, marriages, mortgages) get deployed for military purposes every year for roughly the same amount of time. It's manageable for families.
Military families have a ton of existing social and community support structures to help ease the difficulty of military deployments. Startup culture is not developed to nearly the same degree.
But there are possibly easier solutions to consider. I'd recommend that people with families consider flying back every week or so for a few days. Working remote for a few days and then spending the weekend with the family will be fine, and I've seen lots of people keep that type of arrangement going for many months.
It's very common in the film industry for people with families to work remote on location for most of 12-24 months.
I feel like it has less to do with moving somewhere and more todo with moving specifically to Silicon Valley. I'd much rather move somewhere like Austin or Denver and save $10k in living costs for my business than spend it on rent in the Valley for one summer.
I agree that there's value in being face to face for mentoring like this, but I just don't see why it has to be in the most expensive place to live in the U.S., especially considering the fact that you want to be saving money when starting a business.
Does YC ask you what you plan on doing after 3-4 months? For example, if you wanted to move your company back to Cleveland after the summer, would they not like that? Would your potential next-round investors not like that? I'd have to imagine they'd much rather have you stay in California.
They ask where your company will be based, which is presumably roughly the same thing.
I don't know what their preferences are on answers, but it's known that most venture capitalists prefer that your company be based within a half hour of their offices, so if you're basing the company in a location without funders, it may be hard to fundraise.
I currently live in Chicago, moved here for my job, but my girlfriend back home ended up getting pregnant, so now I got a daughter on the way and I'm moving back home next month, and since she's got a child from a previous relationship, she has agreements with the father to not move any farther than an hour away. Because I could never ask her to move, nor do I want to be that far away from my newborn (bad enough I can't be there through the pregnancy), I refuse to move anywhere else, not even for a job. I've just got higher priorities in my life.
That said: speaking as a cofounder of a brand new company, and despite being corrosively skeptical of YC in the past, if it weren't for the SFBA prereq, we'd apply. You're right, it's annoying!