Experienced Software Engineer - Is jump to HF worth it? Work/Life, cash, stress

Would love y'all's advice. I'm an experienced SWE (~10 years) at one of the largest tech companies. I get pinged by tech recruiters all the time, but I ignore them because I'm not looking to bounce around. I have a family and various side projects so I need a low-key, flexible job, which is exactly what I have in tech now.

Recently a HF recruiting firm looking for SWEs contacted me and at first I blew it off, but they persevered and insisted they could give me significantly higher total comp & equal work/life balance. I'm basically trying to figure out if this is BS or not. Is this just a recruiter trying to make their quota? Or are there SWE jobs in HF that are equally low-key to the top tech companies (for smart people who work efficiently)?

I've searched threads here and a lot of them are pretty negative on tech->HF, ie "don't move from profit side to cost side". I looked at DE Shaw on Glassdoor and it's a mix of "long hours" and "amazing work/life balance", they claim to hire people with cool wacky side projects and support them but maybe that's just marketing to attract applicants. And there isn't good salary data there or here for "Experienced SWE". My W-2 last year was 300k, the recruiter claimed that I could get significantly more, is that realistic?

I guess I'm trying to figure out whether to just accept any interviews that come my way and see what happens, or if it's worth putting effort into properly prepping. I spent weeks working through a coding interview book before getting my current job, and it's now been 15 years since I did brainteasers for fun. It's a competitive field, so it seems hard to get hired without prep, but I'm a busy guy and I'm not going to invest that time unless there's a significant payoff to be earned.

 

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