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I was in the same situation a few years back... the biggest company in the
country made me the same kind of offer and I accepted. I found out the hard
way that
1) Sign-on bonuses are only good for the first year you are employed by the
company. They don't renew them.
2) Relocation bonuses (or whatever they call them) are fine, but they're
taxable. So I got $5K for moving expenses, then the company reported the
$5K as income and I had to pay taxes on the amount on April 15th, without
the convenience of withholding.
A friend of mine passed along some "D'oh!" wisdom after I complained about
the situation: You cut your best deal going in. After that, you are at their
3% per annum mercy, or maybe they'll offer you some worthless stock options.
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