diff --git a/.devcontainer/Dockerfile b/.devcontainer/Dockerfile
index 68d0fe877..abb0a6320 100644
--- a/.devcontainer/Dockerfile
+++ b/.devcontainer/Dockerfile
@@ -28,8 +28,8 @@ RUN groupadd --gid $USER_GID $USER_NAME \
 
 RUN mkdir -p /go/bin \
     && chown -R $USER_NAME: /go \
-    && mkdir -p /opt/pulumi/bin \
-    && chown -R $USER_NAME: /opt/pulumi
+    && mkdir -p $HOME/.pulumi/bin \
+    && chown -R $USER_NAME: $HOME/.pulumi
 
 USER $USER_NAME
 
@@ -38,7 +38,7 @@ USER $USER_NAME
 ENV XDG_CONFIG_HOME=/home/$USER_NAME/.config
 ENV XDG_CACHE_HOME=/home/$USER_NAME/.cache
 
-RUN echo "export PATH=/opt/pulumi:/opt/pulumi/bin:$GOPATH/bin:/usr/local/go/bin:$PATH" >> ~/.bashrc \
+RUN echo "export PATH=$HOME/.pulumi:$HOME/.pulumi/bin:$GOPATH/bin:/usr/local/go/bin:$PATH" >> ~/.bashrc \
     && echo "alias l='ls -aF'" >> ~/.bash_aliases \
     && echo "alias ll='ls -ahlF'" >> ~/.bash_aliases \
     && echo "alias ls='ls --color=auto --group-directories-first'" >> ~/.bash_aliases
diff --git a/.gitpod.yml b/.gitpod.yml
index 9139ccacb..c42ab0288 100644
--- a/.gitpod.yml
+++ b/.gitpod.yml
@@ -5,7 +5,7 @@ image:
 tasks:
   - before: >
       mkdir -p /workspace/opt-pulumi &&
-      sudo ln -s /workspace/opt-pulumi /opt/pulumi
+      sudo ln -s /workspace/opt-pulumi $HOME/.pulumi
     init: >
       make ensure &&
       make install
diff --git a/.gitpod/Dockerfile b/.gitpod/Dockerfile
index 1ac7740b2..8f0c6df76 100644
--- a/.gitpod/Dockerfile
+++ b/.gitpod/Dockerfile
@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 FROM gitpod/workspace-full
 USER gitpod
 
-ENV PATH="/opt/pulumi:/opt/pulumi/bin:$PATH"
+ENV PATH="$HOME/.pulumi:$HOME/.pulumi/bin:$PATH"
 
 # Install .NET Core 3.1 SDK binaries on Ubuntu 20.04
 # Source: https://dev.to/carlos487/installing-dotnet-core-in-ubuntu-20-04-6jh
diff --git a/CONTRIBUTING.md b/CONTRIBUTING.md
index ccae11389..6ac1aad0b 100644
--- a/CONTRIBUTING.md
+++ b/CONTRIBUTING.md
@@ -38,12 +38,10 @@ If you have a web browser, you can get a fully pre-configured Pulumi development
 
 We use `make` as our build system, so you'll want to install that as well, if you don't have it already. We have extremely limited support for doing development on Windows (the bare minimum for us to get Windows validation of `pulumi`) so if you're on windows, we recommend that you use the [Windows Subsystem for Linux](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wsl/install-win10). We'd like to [make this better](https://github.com/pulumi/pulumi/issues/208) so feel free to pitch in if you can.
 
-For historical reasons (which we'd [like to address](https://github.com/pulumi/pulumi/issues/1515)) our build system requires that the folder `/opt/pulumi` exists and is writable by the current user. If you'd like, you can override this location by setting `PULUMI_ROOT` in your environment. The build is known to fail if this doesn't exist, so you'll need to create it first.
+We build Pulumi in `$PULUMI_ROOT`, which defaults to `$HOME/.pulumi`. If you would like to build Pulumi in another location, you do so by setting `$PULUMI_ROOT`. 
 
 ```bash
-mkdir /opt/pulumi
-sudo chown <your_user_name>: /opt/pulumi
-export PATH=/opt/pulumi:/opt/pulumi/bin:$PATH
+export PATH=$HOME/.pulumi/bin:$PATH
 ```
 
 You'll also need to make sure your maximum open file descriptor limit is set to 5000 at a minimum.
diff --git a/build/common.mk b/build/common.mk
index fb3b1ab83..af2d56113 100644
--- a/build/common.mk
+++ b/build/common.mk
@@ -96,9 +96,9 @@ SHELL       := /bin/bash
 STEP_MESSAGE = @echo -e "\033[0;32m$(shell echo '$@' | tr a-z A-Z | tr '_' ' '):\033[0m"
 
 # Our install targets place items item into $PULUMI_ROOT, if it's
-# unset, default to /opt/pulumi.
+# unset, default to `$HOME/.pulumi`.
 ifeq ($(PULUMI_ROOT),)
-	PULUMI_ROOT:=/opt/pulumi
+	PULUMI_ROOT:=$(shell realpath "$$HOME/.pulumi")
 endif
 
 # Use Python 3 explicitly vs expecting that `python` will resolve to a python 3
@@ -168,6 +168,7 @@ test_fast::
 
 install::
 	$(call STEP_MESSAGE)
+	# Implicitly creates PULUMI_ROOT.
 	@mkdir -p $(PULUMI_BIN)
 	@mkdir -p $(PULUMI_NODE_MODULES)
 	@mkdir -p $(PULUMI_NUGET)
diff --git a/pkg/testing/integration/program.go b/pkg/testing/integration/program.go
index 382c29e73..ed38c38e8 100644
--- a/pkg/testing/integration/program.go
+++ b/pkg/testing/integration/program.go
@@ -2008,7 +2008,8 @@ func (pt *ProgramTester) prepareDotNetProject(projinfo *engine.Projinfo) error {
 
 	localNuget := os.Getenv("PULUMI_LOCAL_NUGET")
 	if localNuget == "" {
-		localNuget = "/opt/pulumi/nuget"
+		home := os.Getenv("HOME")
+		localNuget = filepath.Join(home, ".pulumi", "nuget")
 	}
 
 	for _, dep := range pt.opts.Dependencies {
diff --git a/sdk/dotnet/Makefile b/sdk/dotnet/Makefile
index eb4f3ae80..5336f1082 100644
--- a/sdk/dotnet/Makefile
+++ b/sdk/dotnet/Makefile
@@ -66,5 +66,5 @@ brew::
 
 publish:: build install
 	echo "Publishing .nupkgs to nuget.org:"
-	find /opt/pulumi/nuget -name 'Pulumi*.nupkg' \
+	find $(PULUMI_NUGET) -name 'Pulumi*.nupkg' \
 		-exec dotnet nuget push -k ${NUGET_PUBLISH_KEY} -s https://api.nuget.org/v3/index.json {} ';'
diff --git a/sdk/nodejs/README.md b/sdk/nodejs/README.md
index 2e60e2e12..74617d03f 100644
--- a/sdk/nodejs/README.md
+++ b/sdk/nodejs/README.md
@@ -36,7 +36,7 @@ At the moment, we only support building on macOS and Linux, where standard GNU t
 To build the SDK, simply run `make` from the root directory (where this `README` lives, at `sdk/nodejs/` from the repo's
 root).  This will build the code, run tests, and install the package and its supporting artifacts.
 
-At the moment, for local development, we install everything into `/opt/pulumi`.  You will want this on your `$PATH`.
+At the moment, for local development, we install everything into `$HOME/.pulumi`.  You will want this on your `$PATH`.
 
 The tests will verify that everything works, but feel free to try running `pulumi preview` and/or `pulumi up` from
 the `examples/minimal/` directory.  Remember to run `tsc` first, since `pulumi` expects JavaScript, not TypeScript.