I spent three months at Google in 2014 for my MBA internship in between my two years at Harvard Business School. My experience at “the Big G” was fantastic—the food was top notch, the benefits were stellar, and biking around campus in perfect weather?  Sign me up!

But the best part was working with smart, accomplished people who felt they were changing the world. And they were. When Google releases a product, even a small one, it literally changes the lives, at least in some small way, of tens to hundreds of millions of people.

Over the course of my time living there, I caught the Silicon Valley bug. There’s a sense, perpetuated through a couple decades of conversations, essays, competitions, and conferences, that “legit” founders and companies will end up in Silicon Valley.

There’s no question that Silicon Valley is the “venture capital capital” of the world.  Even now, nearly half of all VC dollars flow into California companies, and about half of that is concentrated in the Bay Area.

After I finished my internship, I got a full-time offer from Google. Even though it was compelling, I had caught the entrepreneurial bug and turned it down to found a SaaS startup.

But the question remained: where would I found it?

Given the quality of my colleagues I’d had at Google, the amazing work I saw the company doing, and the persistent general sense that Silicon Valley was the place to be, I started thinking that’s where I had to be, too.

So, I applied for Y Combinator during my final semester of business school (because applying to Y Combinator is what you do!).  My idea was to take on one of the world’s premier companies, Intuit, a Quickbooks alternative. Where else to birth such an ambitious project but in Silicon Valley?

I got invited to interview at YC, and then got called back for another interview (they do this if you’re on the fence), and then got word: it was a no.

I was then faced with a choice—move from Boston to Silicon Valley, with no particular connections and no other reason other than the sense that I was supposed to go there, or go back to my roots in Utah, where I grew up.

Well, the rest is history. I founded ZipBooks in Utah in 2015, and we haven’t looked back since. In fact, every chance I get, I encourage founders to look outside Silicon Valley, especially if they have a credible chance to get funding where they already are. It’s been a fantastic experience for us, and think it could be for you, too. Here’s why.

1. Leverage the connections you already have

When I started raising money in Utah, I sent a few quick emails and immediately had several meetings lined up. In fact, a past mentor of mine had actually formed a seed fund (Peak Ventures) while I was in business school. It was just the leg up I needed, and ended up getting a term sheet from them the week of graduation!

Don’t undervalue the existing connections that you’ve built over the course of school or a career where you’ve already spent time. Those connections can be just what you need to get off the ground.

2. Avoid the raise-and-burn cycle

There’s a sense in the venture-backed startup world, that raising money is a big victory. There’s a correlation, obviously, between raising money and growing fast, and perhaps that’s why it’s so celebrated. But it can be very easy to get sucked into the venture cycle of raising more and more and spending more and more—especially in Silicon Valley, where most companies are run that way.

The downsides, though, are obvious for the entrepreneur.  If you are continuously raising and spending, your company may be growing, but at the same time you may become so diluted that your stake in the business is approaching negligible.

Remember that when you raise money from venture capitalists, you’re issuing “preferred stock,” meaning they get their money out first (as they should). So even if you sell your company for $100m, if you’ve raised $100m to get there, guess how much you’re walking away with?

Zilch.

The pressure to run your business that way is less intense outside of Silicon Valley. There are more companies (on a percentage basis) that have bootstrapped for a while, retained ownership, and grown based on their revenue. The cycle may take longer, but founders retain both significant stake and control (examples include my neighbors Qualtrics and the recently-IPO’d Pluralsight).

3. Live your life

When I graduated from Harvard, I was already married with three kids (we had our third while in Boston). I was no longer in “pre-life” mode—I was 100% in the middle of it. That meant that while I had high ambitions and strong work ethic, I was going to be home in the evenings. That was non-negotiable for me.

But I didn’t know if I could do that in Silicon Valley.

The culture there is infamous, to this day, for a blatant disregard for work-life balance. The sense is that you should sacrifice life on the altar of growth. And whether through cultural pressure and self-justification, or actual pressure from a board that controlled the company, I’m not sure I would have been able to buck that trend.

Outside of that Silicon Valley pressure cooker, I’ve been able to balance my life the way I want to: I get up early, go to work, and work hard—every day. But I’m home by 6:30 and have at least a couple hours with my kids. It’s a tight schedule, for sure. And I hope someday it eases up even more. But with an average business horizon of 10 years, there’s no way I’m missing the meat of my kids’ childhoods just to grow faster.

If you’re founding a company and feeling that magnetic pull to Silicon Valley that I felt, pause for a moment and consider reasons to stay put, right where you are.  It might just be the best decision you could make for your business—and for your life.

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Tim Chaves is CEO at ZipBooks, online accounting software for small businesses. Tim previously founded and sold two small businesses, and holds an MBA from Harvard Business School.