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People who aren’t living in NYC or HCOL California areas what does your employment and housing situation look like?
DiscussionI moved to Northern Ireland and we own our house (mortgaged) on a single income.
I wanted to expand this to non US because I hate how US centered this sub is but I wasn’t sure how to be specific to exclude these two demographics that dominate this sub. But good for you, I’ve wanted to move to the UK for years but the salary is so low compared to what I do in the US, I would say it’s worth it but the cost of living is in crisis in both places. It’s just not worth a 60k cut in salary.
We definitely have our problems here too. (I lived in PA until I was 22, moved here after meeting my hubby online (deviantART)) Salaries are definitely lower but you also don’t have to pay for insurance. There’s a lot of differences but I’ve not had coffee yet and don’t wanna bore you lol.
We live in rural Illinois, town of less than 10,000. I work a remote customer service job for a tech company and I'm making about $93k total yearly comp while my wife is a SAHM who homeschools our 4 kids. We bought 5 acres with a 3 bed/2 bath 1100 sq ft mobile home and a 3000sqft metal pole barn on the property 3 years ago for about $150k and spent another $75k converting the barn into our current house. Our mortgage is $950/month and our house is 4 bed/4 bath and comes in around 3200 sqft. We own 3 cars outright (2007 Jeep Commander and a 2005 as well as a 2016 Town & Country van.
Sounds like you're living the dream.
I drove through rural Illinois last year and it was lots of corn fields and grain silos.
How are you making so much for a remote customer service job?
I grew up in central Illinois and that’s a lot for a remote csr job!
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And besides, the DC Metro has lots of fun and interesting stuff to do.
Also very diverse, especially on the Maryland side where my wife and I used to live.
What part of the DC area? NOVA?
I live in northern Indiana. I've been working for the same company for almost 18 years. My wife works in the lab in a hospital. I suppose we probably make more than average for the area. Bought a house in 2013. Would really like to move to a bigger house, but kind of trapped by the really nice interest rate that we have right now.
I live cheaply in a relative’s house who moved elsewhere, I have worked a series of odd jobs, and I have been circling around graduate school with varying levels of commitment and anxiety ever since my “California Dreams” were rudely interrupted by the pandemic in 2020. 😂
I understand, my PhD work was beyond screwed by the pandemic. I’m finishing so late and I’m so far behind because all my research experiments were scrapped. Then the Ukraine Russia war limited our helium supply so we had to shut down an instrument I was working on. Hope you get back to place you feel good about.
I’m really sorry to hear that, and thank you so much. I chose pathways that likely would have been difficult even apart from the various upheavals our generation has faced, and I’ve had a fair share of personal difficulties to boot, but I keep reaching. It can be hard to detach. I honestly think I became so familiar with feeling behind or defective that it doesn’t mean the same thing to me anymore. Which is not to say that I don’t feel disaffected, but I truly feel I am on my own path, for better or worse. There’s a freedom in that. I feel, at least in part, like I (everyone, really) can be a genuine novelty and disruptor of the status quo instead of having to compare aptly; I feel like it’s an inevitable “truth” that we all face at some point. Luckily that is really more my nature anyways—although it would be nice if the world could remind me a little more gently sometimes. So, thanks for being gentle. I really hope things go in your favor, too, in a way you can feel good about. Existential satisfaction is deeply personal and certainly hard-won.
I went to law school in a low to medium cost of living area in a medium sized metro, moved to NYC, moved back to said medium sized metro, bought a 4 BR 2.5 Bath house there. After 3 years of suburban hell I had to GTFO of there and moved to a VHCOL CA area. I rent in my current area but have fully paid off mortgages due to the money I make here that I couldn’t obtain in the medium sized metro.
When I lived in the lower COL smaller city, I felt like I had all the money in the world and nothing to do but travel away from the area. I traveled a LOT in those 3 years. I realized it’s because my “home city” sucked ass. Now that I live in my current large city, I couldn’t be happier and don’t have the urge to travel anymore because everyday life is way better. There’s actually stuff to do here and interesting people to do stuff with.
That’s worth noting but I specifically wanted to hear from non HCOL California people because I’m trying to gauge things without the major HCOL outliers.
I lived in a non-HCOL part of CA known as Kings County. Lots of the single income people I know were able to own homes out there and in the neighboring Kern County, which in turn is literally adjacent to the most populated county in America and the largest county by land size in the contiguous US.
I will admit that (1) the people I know work in healthcare, which is a high paying career and (2) a lot are immigrants who were sponsored so while the first few years of their careers in America were not so lucrative, they have since taken on higher wages and had zero debt when establishing themselves here.
There’s a term of endearment for these folks (nurses from the Philippines): “BSN,” or Bahay Sa Nurse. It means “living off a nurse” - because they are so financially comfortable, their families can sustain on a single household income.
Many come over as third world immigrants and buy houses. Thanks in part to US healthcare , Filipinos constitute the third highest median household income based on race.
I lived in Kern County for a few years. It was great because you could get a 2700 sq ft house for ~$340k (not anymore, sadly) because who wants to live in the desert, but it was a 20 minute drive to nearly anything you'd need to buy and about 1.5 hours to downtown LA if you really wanted it (or however long the metrolink ride was, I didn't use it because I wasn't near the station).
Fair enough, but I thought I’d give you a datapoint as someone who lived in both and was employed in both situations. I did six years in a low to medium COL area not too long ago too. I went through a phase where I prioritized saving as much $ as possible over QOL.
I understand but are you from a LCOL or MCOL area?
I hear you. I wasn't building home equity living in the SF Bay Area, but there was tons of stuff to do there. Now that I'm married and have kids, it isn't a viable option.
I live in a LCOL area with a really decent remote job. I own my house outright, have less than a grand in cc debt and I’m able to travel frequently. I live in a nature heavy state, and aside from January and February, I don’t mind being here at all.
Sounds like a great set-up, congrats.
I would live in a rural setting, but I like Costco and a nearby airport.
I moved to IL after being priced out of NV by Californians during the pandemic. We got lucky in that my husband's job was a true WFH job prior to the pandemic so we were able to use our NV income to purchase, which got us a 4 bedroom house on 2 lots in a small city, a 5 minutes drive to amenities and one of the best park districts I've ever seen for outdoorsy types. It not California, but I'm really happy and my kids are thriving in a way I haven't seen in a long time.
Urbana?
I live in a LCOL area in the Midwest. My husband and is purchased a house 11 years ago; we refinanced a few years ago and locked in a 2.85% rate. Our mortgage is 13% of our take home pay (with utilities we’re at about 15.5%).
Town of 5k in rural Michigan
Mega plant announcement a couple years ago sent every landlord out here into a frenzy on top of everything else the world is dealing with so.. rent is currently 1,400 a month. Cheapest livable houses are about 200k. Cheapest rent is around a thousand.
Full time butcher and wife is WFH sales rep. Combined income less then six figures.
Cheapest livable houses are about 200k.
I'm surprised you can find any house that cheap anywhere in America.
Honestly, even though I miss living in Torrance CA, living in a small town makes it easier to survive for sure, where I'm not stressed to hell about my income and rent anymore. With that though, I miss out on things I used to do when living in So Cal.
Living at the end of a row house. I own the share, costs are reasonably low (the money paid to the company is spent on future renovations, bathroom and sauna are getting floors renewed next). Costs are lower than renting. I moved half an hour further away from downtown to be able to afford to own instead of renting.
Rent prices for an apartment smaller than this row house have already gone up so far that it equals the purchase price of this house in about 4 years. I'll repay the mortgage with the single income in a decade, and then I'll own this thing, or if the wifey finds a job we might pay this back in five.
Employment situation, I have no idea. I think, just like globally, opportunities are down. I'm currently employed, going on for almost a decade, in the same company. Full WFH, I've moved over an hour away from the offices. Would not return to full office ever again, I'd rather take a pay cut than that.
a row house
Baltimore?
Finland, I'm one of the dozens of people on Reddit that lives outside of US. Managed to get my wife to move out of America too, to the land of socialized healthcare.
And an impossibly hard language?
Work 7 days on and 7 days off at a hospital. I own a single family home and a townhome. Single family income.
You’ll have to be more specific. You just described like 2 billion people.
I live near Portland, ME, make 50k a year, mortgage (plus tax and homeowners) varies from $1200-$1350 a month year to year. Bought during covid, just before the pandemic price spike went wild.
I have a couple friends trying to buy now with similar income to me, and it's much harder to buy a place than it was then - prices are still up a lot places around here, and the higher interest rates make that a double whammy of suck for them. For context, if I bought my place now instead of then, my monthly would be more like $2000-$2500 and I probably couldn't afford it either.
On the other hand, renting in my area has gotten better than it was a couple years ago, and I have friends finding one bedrooms for under $1000 a month again. Which is still higher than it should be, but better than it's been. People willing to pick up roommate situations I've seen getting their share be anywhere from $500 (this is an outlier, but also has three other roommates in a three bedroom, one pair is a couple) to $900 a month. Sometimes with utilities included, sometimes not.
Was born and raised in a small town. GTFO after college, eventually moved to another small town that was actually great and also HCOL (it was a resort town; a blue dot in a sea of red, with a delightful mix of interesting people and amenities usually only found in larger metros). I was working as a full-time newspaper journalist there. The only time I lived alone there was in a $750/mo rather small 1-bedroom. Otherwise I had to have a roommate or two for $2000+ 2-bedrooms.
The pandemic ruined everything: an influx of new residents escaping COVID + lack of available housing + instantaneous skyrocket in housing prices forced me to leave and move back home to the small town, where I currently rent a comfortable, small 1-bedroom for $325/mo. Currently work full-time night shift at a residential treatment facility in the closest city. But I'm going back to school this fall for a master's. Turns out the small town isn't as bad as I thought it was when I was a kid -- rather it was just that I was, well, a kid, and didn't have any agency of my own and was trapped in an ultraconservative religious family. Also, national culture shifted enough in the 10 years since I'd previously lived there that LGBT people can live here openly now (could not have imagined that circa 2010).
it was a resort town; a blue dot in a sea of red, with a delightful mix of interesting people and amenities usually only found in larger metros
Park City, Utah?
Live in a mid-sized city in North Carolina, my wife and I both work remote jobs. Mine is somewhat specialized and I have an MBA and a long career in my industry. We gross around $160K ($170K w/ bonuses). Mortgage is $1400, bought around 5 years ago. House would likely sell for $380K today, in a great neighborhood, so the mortgage if bought today would be close to twice that. We are very comfortable, have about 2-3 more years of grinding and should be able to coast for the rest of our careers due to investments/retirement.
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I live in the Maryland peninsula home prices are still being bid like crazy but rent is affordable.
Bought a 1800 sq foot house in ND in 2012 for $120k. We took out a 15 year mortgage at 3%. Monthly payment was around $1k. Added a 750 sq foot addition a few years later. My wife was beginning her career as an attorney at the time and I was starting a business. I sold my business a few years ago and am semi-retired.
My wife and I are teachers and we own our home in Michigan.
I'm in a fairly LCOL area right now. My mortgage PITI is about $2100/month for a 3100 sq ft house.
The tradeoff is I am a bit outside of town in a state that apparently doesn't believe in efficient road networks (South Carolina), but I can get into the city in 40 minutes (would be 25-30 with decent roads...) so it's not all bad. I ended up going into the city more than my own town because the inefficient roads make it take nearly 25 minutes to get to anything there anyway.
I work 50 hrs/wk and have no debts and good credit. I make more than I ever have in my life and I have to live with my parents because things are that fucked here. The last time I saw a house that was affordable, it was half the size of what I had before my divorce about 7 years ago, over 50% more expensive, and literally (yes, literally) had no walls as they demo'd it during the winter and you know the mold settled in on what little was left.
Employment is mostly crap in the surrounding areas. A lot of low paying customer service jobs, which would have been enough for me had the divorce gone in my favor. But now it seems that for all my efforts to find a better job, the economy puts in twice the effort to get worse.
Yikes! Fl is the same way! 200,000 for a home that needs a complete demo it’s ridiculous! We had to move out of state!
And this is in Idaho too. I'd leave if I could, but we supposedly have a low cost of living here. It definitely has me wanting to give up.
I have a house, bought with my parents help, that is paid off. It's a major fixer-upper that we have put a lot of time and money into, but got for a steal 10 years ago. I'm under-employed, but in a stable job that pays above the national average and decently my state's average salary. I live paycheck to paycheck, but it's not tight to the point I'm constantly stressing about it.
From west coast Fl but was forced to move in 2021 due to everyone moving there. We bought a 6 bedroom house for 89,500! My husband was fortunate to have a WFH job with his Fl wage ( it’s not a lot but more than here in PA) I work as a caregiver, and my parents live with us. It’s not where I pictured myself at, and I get homesick often but it’s life and we’re making it!
We bought have a 6 bedroom house for 89,500!
Huh?
I moved to the Raleigh area last year, which is cheap compared to NY/CA, but getting expensive quickly. I work remotely for a CA Bay Area tech company, but don’t have to live in CA. It’s great, because it actually makes life super affordable in a fun, family-friendly area with insanely good weather year round.
I live in a tourist town in Colorado. Houses are expensive to buy here but everything else is relatively affordable compared to a major city. We bought our house in 2018 for a little under 400k. Combined my wife and I make around 150 a year and we have one kid. I’m a firefighter and my wife works for the local electrical utility. We’re not wealthy or anything but I feel comfortable.
I live in a low-medium COL location. You can find 1 bedroom apartments in the bad part of town for 900, but any real apartment in a desirable part of town will be 1500+++
Average home price is 268-471k depending on specific zip code, but you’ll sell it in less then a month. My neighbor sold his 374k house in 6 days in November of 2023.
Median household income in my zip is 96k
Gas is about $3.20
Paid 315 in 2019 for a house that’s currently worth about 550.
Live in Austin, TX. COL is quite high, and even though we're DINKs making collectively over 200k, it's just comfortable enough.
Job is good. Company went through a brief refractory period laying off 10% total employees over the course of 2023. Holding steady now and performing well. No risk IMO.
We have a great rental property, where we've been the last several years but we really want to upsize but are saving up to hopefully buy if there's a dip. Rent is about 35% of my individual income monthly for 900 sqft with a fenced yard in a killer area close to downtown.
I live in a suburb of a MCOL midwest metro. We bought our house about 10 years ago for $315k. Today it would sell for about $450k. Nicer houses for sale in my area range from $200k to several million. There is quite a bit of racism baked in when people refuse to consider houses in areas on the lower end of that range because my city is still highly segregated. My partner and I both work in data. I make low six figures and work fully remote. My partner is hybrid. His commute is about 30 minutes each way. We keep our finances separate, but we are on the same page of living frugally so that we can both invest a substantial portion of our incomes toward retirement. Our city is very under-rated when it comes to fun things to do. We have a great food, festival, museum, and natural area scene. I don’t buy the narrative that we have to live in VHCOL cities in order to have good jobs that pay well enough to have comfortable lives. Life is secretly pretty good in fly over country.
I’m in Louisville, KY currently. I am a pharmacist and I live in an uncommonly cheap $780 apartment. Typically apartments around here are $1000+. I’ve looked into buying a condo, but with current mortgage rates, it’s cheaper for me to rent right now and so I will wait until a mortgage is cheaper than my rent.
Work for the govt, rent a room because I don't want to live by myself or have to deal with owning.
Up until very recently, my wife and I owned a house in South Carolina. One of its few larger-ish metro areas. Cost of living has gone up rather dramatically but we bought in 2017 in the mid 200k's, refinanced during COVID and were living very comfortably on a 2.5% 15 yr mortgage. Combined we make about 180k, but I'm a teacher, so my wife makes the majority of that.
Life changed, now we're moving. Sold the house and made about $270k from the sale but it's not getting us very far in the search for a new house in Virginia. We'll be okay, but we're going to have to rethink our monthly expenses.
If it were just me on my own... I'd have to rethink a lot of things.
Rent in Philly. $1200 studio.
Edmonton, AB, Canada
Bought a small house in 2016 in a working class neighbourhood for $335k (preferred this over taking the whole pre approval amount for 500k and being house poor). We renewed before rates went up so our payments with property tax are still low which is good.
That being said whereas housing is still affordable here, everything else is expensive. There isn’t as much competition in Canada so we pay a lot more for groceries, telecom, utilities, insurance
We have low unemployment rates, though.
Middle of Indiana , doing very well financially and we own our own SFH with attached two car garage on a quarter acre lot with two paid off cars. Life is good
MCOL Area near larger city
Renting 4bed/2bath house for $2K Monthly
Earning about $6K take home
Saving for a house
Dual income, 3 kids in coastal SC. Over 200k hhi.
Housing here is pretty nuts for the areas we want, but luckily we were gifted a home 13 years ago that was then worth about 300k, now would go for 900k. We put a little over 200k into it, which we mortgaged under favorable rates.
I live in a very rural area in the northern US. There is 0 housing options for younger people here. All of it was turned into short term rentals. I live with my parents, and I foresee living with or near them on their property for the rest of their lives. I don't really mind. As they get older, I can be here to help them. Also, I'm extremely sick after developing a post-viral syndrome after a COVID infection. Living alone while this ill would be impossible. Still, I see the effects of not having enough younger people in the area.... so there are housing coalitions funded by the wealthy that are trying to address the lack of housing. I can only wish them luck.
Location: Albuquerque, NM
Housing: We have a 5-bed, 3.5-bath house purchased in 2019. Our mortgage is $1400 and that includes property taxes and insurance.
Employment: I'm making ~$115k as a fully remote engineer working for the US military. My team is at a HCOL location, but they'd rather hire people to work remotely than compete with local industries (most engineers with my level of experience make quite a bit more.) I'm also an engineer officer in the national guard, so I make between $15-30k annually depending on how much they activate me. My wife works part-time as a nurse midwife, but her schedule/income is sporadic.
Overall, I feel like life is good, but we have our fair share of challenges. Financial literacy is just as important if not more than earning power.
I live in a B1G university town in the Midwest. My career is in higher education and I moved here for this role about 6 years ago. I've lived in the same apartment since I moved here and rent increased a little bit every year until the past couple of years. It will end up being a $150/mo increase from two years ago (total). Contextually, I moved from Fargo, ND where my studio rent was $480/mo. I'm paying 2.5x more now.
I think I pay too much for rent for 1) the size of the city 2) living right on the edge of town. But my place is fairly nice and I feel safe so I try not to complain too much despite my annoyances.
$100k/year working for the state. Bought a 2 bed/2 bath garden home in 2012 for $125k (currently valued around $175k). Monthly payment (mortgage, interest, insurance) is $640.
My mom and I bought a house together outside of Phoenix. We got in while the houses were still being sold for under 400k and the insurance rates were still under 6%. Mom got a loan on her 401-k for the down payment and our credit scores together secured the mortgage. I live in the house and pay the mortgage, and she lives in an apartment in CA (she wants to move here but isn't quite ready yet- she is paying over $3k/mo in rent and the mortgage for the house is $2.8k/mo).
I was making ~150K-200K at the time at a job that was destroying me. I built up a decent savings at that time. I got a nice severance when I was laid off. I make considerably less now ($80k) but am still comfortable. I haven't been super smart about my savings and have unfortunately depleted most of it for both emergencies and non-emergencies. No trouble paying my bills, though I have not put anything into my own 401k in about a year (current employer is too small to have 401k set up just yet).
My boyfriend moved in two years ago and he currently makes ~60k working for the school district. He offsets some of the bills and half the mortgage, so that has given me a little wiggle room in terms of not completely depleting my savings.
Once we get over this current hump of medical issues for our pets, I will be focusing on rebuilding my savings and paying off some credit cards as quickly as possible.
Rural Alabama. Bought my home in 2017. 1600sq ft. $621 a month
Work maintenance at a plant that makes cars
Fucking pretty good
I make 77k and have a mortgage of $2380 in Florida.
Live 10 minutes from the ocean in NC. My mortgage on my house I bought new in 2018 is $939. I live in paradise and am never moving
I (35/M) grew up in South FL 1988-2019, lived in Chicago 2019-2023 and am back in South FL with family while I figure out my next move. I’m a senior financial analyst for my Chicago employer @ $115k incl. bonus.
South FL affordability has gotten considerably worse. Wages have always been low here but now cost of living is out of control. My first apartment (2010) was a 3/2 in Delray Beach with 2 other roommates for $1,400 and it’s now $3,700. I worked at Publix 35 hrs while in school and made it work (did have financial support also but could have done it without). I dunno if I could do that again now in this state and I really feel for the young and disadvantaged population here.
I wanna buy a starter house here sometime in the next year but these prices are insane in addition to insurance, interest rates, etc. I’ll probably leave the state again if I lose this job and/or can’t find a suitable house and I dunno if I’d be back.
Well, I live in NE Tennessee. Back in 2018, I became unemployed and was desperate for a job other than retail and fast food. Even now, that's mainly all that's around here. So, I bit the bullet and became a school bus driver. Still am now surprisingly. The only reason I can do ok on the income is because I'm being paid a little more and I live in a mobile home that's 50 years old and wearing out. Rent around here on average has risen to ~$800-ish. Used to be $650 or so a few years back.
HHI of 180 purchased a house in 2022 for 299k. Intentionally bought well below what most people in our income would buy so we could have a very comfortable life and hopefully retire early.
I live in the Chicago suburbs (grew up in the city) so idk if this counts as a HCOL. Probably not?
Anyway, I live in a small-ish town about 30-45 mins outside the city limits (depending on traffic) and I work full time in another much larger and more well known suburb. Between my wife and I, we make about $150k/year, we have two kids own a home we purchased in 2019 for $165k. At the time, we were making about $95k together (this is why I don’t think it’s HCOL)
We don’t live paycheck to paycheck anymore, we budget every dollar, which we did even back when we had to live paycheck to paycheck. It’s probably just a habit that stuck, and probably for the best.
Anyway, we do okay for ourselves.
My husband and I live a small, rural town in the Midwest in a 2100 sq foot home that we own. It was built in 1900 so it’s definitely aging but the previous owners remodeled most of it. We paid 135k for it in 2017 and refinanced in 2020 at 2.75% interest. Our monthly payment is around $450 but we don’t have taxes and insurance included. We own a 2013 van outright and my husband drives a work vehicle. We’re going pretty good on one income but we aren’t saving anything beyond what automatically goes into his Ira so that been a bit frustrating for us.
We have 3 kids, 2 of which attend our small elementary school and I’m planning on picking up part time work once our youngest is in preschool which will be the 25/26 school year. Life is pretty mundane and wonderful.
I left NY years ago and it has been great. I moved to Michigan and never looked back. Plenty of jobs here and still a blue state
I live in central Pennsylvania and currently rent. We are definitely a MCOL (albeit to the lower side of MCOL). I rent a studio apartment though to save money to buy a house; paying around $1k a month including a monthly parking fee. I make around $88k a year plus bonuses that range from $500 to $8k depending on a significant number of factors, though most years I have gotten around $1,500.
Starter homes run between $150k and $250k; depending on location, size, and your definition of starter. However, home prices have jumped around 25-40% since 2020, when I was first looking pre-pandemic, starter homes ran closer in the range of $100k to $200k.
I live in the Springfield area of Western Mass. I rent a 2 bedroom for $1500. I have to do the landscaping/shoveling and I pay for trash, electric, internet, and oil on top of my rent. Our driveway is dirt and constantly floods. The kitchen hasn’t been touched since at least 2000 when the last tenant moved in. This was the best bargain we could find. Everything else around us was over $1000 for a one bedroom in run down buildings
I work remotely for a company based in Texas making about $80k a year. My husband has been trying to find work as an engineer but responses are slow. The recruiter he’s working with is bringing jobs to him that are out of state. So for now, he makes $20/hr as a mechanic for a dealership
OKC resident/homeowner here. I saw I’d say we’re MCOL. For reference on the appreciation scale, we live in a decent 2400 sq ft single family on a quarter acre lot. We paid $330k in 2019 and tax assessor/insurance quotes are saying it’s worth $430k now. Not too bad to the $250k< average appreciation I’ve been reading about on the coasts.
I know a few people who have remote jobs from the coasts who are banking here due to the COL differences. West coast pay and MCOL expenses? Yes, please!
I feel like the job market is good here, but that’s probably going to depend on what you do. I’m a licensed attorney who doesn’t practice much because I don’t like it. I make money building houses. Given that I have the freedom to take that pay cut? Yeah I’d say that the employment situation is good. My wife is a nurse, so I’m not worried about her ever losing her job, given the nationwide nursing shortage.
I'm in Colorado and it's really not much better out here. Houses have increased by anywhere from 25-75% in many areas, and anything that's even remotely affordable is either SUPER tiny or needs a lot of work (as in it's gutted down to the studs).
I may be able to afford something in a year or five.
Living single in Colorado Springs with a mortgage. It's kind of HCOL but not as bad as the Denver metro. I work remotely and am loving it.
Moved from LA to a lower COL area. Quality of life has improved significantly. Living situation, traffic, work. It has worked well for us.
Living in a low COL on a single income and although living here is somewhat “affordable” it absolutely sucks in terms of being the right vibe for me. The area is dense with families, religious people, and people who were born and raised here and I don’t fit into any of those categories. Sure, there are activities to do but it has been difficult to meet people in my age group. So I’m wondering whether a HCOL area is the future trade off for actually “liking” where I live.
Pa here, about 25-30% under median USA home price. Salary around 200k as a researcher but surprisingly high taxes, so net after all expenses - housing, cars, food, any other expense, I probably net around 60k. Not a bad living, certainly not as high salary as I've been seeing colleagues get in the tech world, but no complaints, clean living, and this is my third house.
I live in what I consider MCOL - 30-60 minutes outside of Salt Lake City, UT. I make $165K plus a bonus that ranges from 8-12% depending on a number of factors. Have a B.S. degree in Digital Media from a state school and I'm a senior product manager for a large tech company no one’s ever heard of unless you’re one of our customers (B2B SaaS). But there’s a very high likelihood you’ve interacted with my company’s product within the last week. We're integrated into a lot of websites, apps, etc.
I'm the sole provider for my family - wife is a SAHM. Have 2 kids, 2 dogs, 2 cats, 1 car payment and a mortgage. We built/bought our house in 2013 for $185k, refinanced in 2020 and it's currently worth about $450-500k if we were to sell.
TL;DR - Life sucks sometimes, but because of a lay-off I eventually learned my market value and haven't let anyone tell me different since then.
Some additional perspective - I was severely underemployed until early 2019 when I was laid off from an absolutely abysmal workplace. I didn't realize just how depressed I was until the relief at not having to go to work hit me the day after I was told I was being let go. I was making $65K/year at that place - I was on-call 24/7, expected to respond to emails, Slack, etc. when on vacation or even just at home, and the management was nothing but narcissistic assholes. I spent the following 6 months unemployed trying to find work until a recruiter changed my life.
I had applied for a job that I seemed qualified for and didn't get a response (like usual) but the recruiter reached out separately to talk to me. She helped me punch up my resume a bit, and talked through my experience some more. She explained how I was undervaluing myself and that was probably part of why I hadn't landed a job yet. She then put me in for a job with another company no one's heard of and told them my salary requirement was $100k/year. I thought she was nuts, but she told me I could probably get more at a more software-driven place. 3 quick interviews and 2 weeks later and I had a job and my $100k/year.
I actually cried when she called me to tell me the good news prior to the formal offer - we were less than a month from considering selling our house. This job turned out to be one of the best things that has ever happened to me. I had good managers, I had a workplace that was actually trying to help us to succeed and best of all (not so good for them) they helped me see how valuable my rather unique skillset really is. When I mentioned off-hand to my boss that a recruiter had reached out to me but I turned them down I suddenly got a 20% raise. I was now making nearly double what I had been 1.5 years before.
I realized I could do even better. I set my LinkedIn status that I was open to work and a recruiter for my current position reached out. 2 quick interviews in less than a week and I've been here for over 2 years now. I told the recruiter my salary requirement (I thought there was no way I'd get what I asked for) and they actually met my internal "This is what they'd have to offer me to change jobs" number.
Very good. Both my wife and I work good jobs (so we do have to pay for daycare unfortunately, but can afford it). We built a large house in 2020 that we love in a pretty affluent suburb. Live in the Midwest.
Moved from California to South Dakota. Can afford a 2 bed 2 bath apartment on full time work no problem. No income tax is nice but being able to buy a decent house isn’t going to be easy on a single income once I get to that point due to the shit property taxes, interest rate, and insurance rate plus property on the Black hills side of the state isn’t cheap.
I live in the foothills of Appalachia, compared to most places extremely low cost living (like can survive on around 40-50k a year and live well at least before COVID) , I work in the technology space for a large manufacturing facility. I built my home in 2019 3 bed 2 bath on a little under an acre. We are a single income family with 3 children. For age perspective both my wife and I are 30. It gets tight from time to time but we’ve been managing well given the current state of everything.
$116k/year. Wife makes $105k.
We bought a 2,200sq ft house on 1.68 acres back in 2020 for $258k. It's about $400k now.
So... Looks REAL good.
Edited: my wife has two degrees. I don't have a degree. I make sure to remind her of that all the time.
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