Leaving DC for a lower COL area

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps upstate NY truly is cheaper, but be careful about assuming YOUR costs will be cheaper. I come from a western state that ostensibly is cheaper, but when I look at houses (neighborhoods) I would want to live in, the home cost is the same as here. Restaurants (decent, nothing fancy) are more expensive. Property taxes are less. Etc. We will probably retire out there, but not counting on it being cheaper.

Very valid point. I romanticized about moving out west, to Bozeman, MT, and when I looked at real estate prices, I realized it's really not that much cheaper. But where I'm from in upstate NY, I could get a nice house in a great school district for less than $200,000. I know that plenty of places are more expensive, but....200k! That's a downpayment around here.

There is also something to be said about a slower pace of life and not dealing with all of the BS that comes with our super Type A community in DC. I don't know if I can put a price on that.

+1. A lot of people on this forum seem to not realize that real estate prices have climbed in many other parts of the country. It’s like they think real estate is what it was when they were growing up. Even looking at my childhood home I was shocked how much it costs now.

You can probably find a less expensive house but for real estate to truly be MUCH cheaper means the job market in that area is limited and there is limited money to push up real estate prices. Also don’t discount moving from an area with public transportation to one where people have multiple cars per family. When driving around MCOL areas I’m always shocked at how most of the cars are new and fancy. It’s like instead of spending more on real estate they spend it on cars.

All, well, most areas have seen prices go up. It's called inflation. House prices probably doubled, on average, between 1999 and 2019. But they also did the same thing between 1979 and 1999. Actually, even more. My parents bought their house in a provincial city that's not one of the "hot" cities for 52k in 1976, sold it for 208k in 1994, bought another house for 300k and just sold that house for 650k. It's inflation. It's an upper middle class suburb with good schools.

Some cities (not all, but some) have seen higher than average real estate price increases. But the vast majority of the country remains much more affordable than DC.

^ totally this! I find it so weird how fatalistic people seem about living in DC - like they may as well not even explore other options because surely every place will have the same downsides and so why even bother.

there's a lot of nice places to live. lots cheaper than DC. DC is nice too but expensive.

Because JOBS

There are JOBS in other places. We have a sub 4% unemployment and a booming upper middle class across most American cities.

I think a lot of people get trapped into DC because of the artificially higher salaries paying 25-40% more for the same role than in, say, Atlanta or Minneapolis and are afraid to take bite the bullet and readjust to a lower salary even with a lower cost of living offsetting it.

In our case, and I know there are a lot of other people in the same situation, it's not that the same job would pay less in another place; it's that our types of jobs don't even exist anywhere else. I would love to move to Minneapolis or Omaha but I'm not really qualified to do anything there. It would take a lot of reworking of my resume to even attempt it, and with both my DH and I trying to do that, the job security just isn't there.

If you can't leave you can't leave. But I hear a lot of people who seem to act as if there's no possibility of ANYONE leaving DC because DC is where the jobs are, and it's just not the case.

People in Minneapolis are working. In Tampa they're working. In Providence. Why I bet you'd even find that out in other cities as well.

[Anonymous]

We made this move but were leaving the bay area. We are all super happy and have a lot less stress. We live much better than we did there. Kids are happy, we are happy. I think 5 yrs is too long, OP. I would make the move sooner. If we had done this a year or two earlier, our mortgage would be significantly lower than it is now. The houses seem to have gone up a not-insignificant percentage each year for the last few years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps upstate NY truly is cheaper, but be careful about assuming YOUR costs will be cheaper. I come from a western state that ostensibly is cheaper, but when I look at houses (neighborhoods) I would want to live in, the home cost is the same as here. Restaurants (decent, nothing fancy) are more expensive. Property taxes are less. Etc. We will probably retire out there, but not counting on it being cheaper.

Very valid point. I romanticized about moving out west, to Bozeman, MT, and when I looked at real estate prices, I realized it's really not that much cheaper. But where I'm from in upstate NY, I could get a nice house in a great school district for less than $200,000. I know that plenty of places are more expensive, but....200k! That's a downpayment around here.

There is also something to be said about a slower pace of life and not dealing with all of the BS that comes with our super Type A community in DC. I don't know if I can put a price on that.

+1. A lot of people on this forum seem to not realize that real estate prices have climbed in many other parts of the country. It’s like they think real estate is what it was when they were growing up. Even looking at my childhood home I was shocked how much it costs now.

You can probably find a less expensive house but for real estate to truly be MUCH cheaper means the job market in that area is limited and there is limited money to push up real estate prices. Also don’t discount moving from an area with public transportation to one where people have multiple cars per family. When driving around MCOL areas I’m always shocked at how most of the cars are new and fancy. It’s like instead of spending more on real estate they spend it on cars.

All, well, most areas have seen prices go up. It's called inflation. House prices probably doubled, on average, between 1999 and 2019. But they also did the same thing between 1979 and 1999. Actually, even more. My parents bought their house in a provincial city that's not one of the "hot" cities for 52k in 1976, sold it for 208k in 1994, bought another house for 300k and just sold that house for 650k. It's inflation. It's an upper middle class suburb with good schools.

Some cities (not all, but some) have seen higher than average real estate price increases. But the vast majority of the country remains much more affordable than DC.

^ totally this! I find it so weird how fatalistic people seem about living in DC - like they may as well not even explore other options because surely every place will have the same downsides and so why even bother.

there's a lot of nice places to live. lots cheaper than DC. DC is nice too but expensive.

Because JOBS

There are JOBS in other places. We have a sub 4% unemployment and a booming upper middle class across most American cities.

I think a lot of people get trapped into DC because of the artificially higher salaries paying 25-40% more for the same role than in, say, Atlanta or Minneapolis and are afraid to take bite the bullet and readjust to a lower salary even with a lower cost of living offsetting it.

In our case, and I know there are a lot of other people in the same situation, it's not that the same job would pay less in another place; it's that our types of jobs don't even exist anywhere else. I would love to move to Minneapolis or Omaha but I'm not really qualified to do anything there. It would take a lot of reworking of my resume to even attempt it, and with both my DH and I trying to do that, the job security just isn't there.

If you can't leave you can't leave. But I hear a lot of people who seem to act as if there's no possibility of ANYONE leaving DC because DC is where the jobs are, and it's just not the case.

People in Minneapolis are working. In Tampa they're working. In Providence. Why I bet you'd even find that out in other cities as well.

I think it's more complicated than those two extremes for many people. I know that in my field, there are plenty of places with one or two potential employers, but only a handful (maybe 6ish) of large cities with numerous potential employers. Unless you're happy to pack up and relocate every time you switch employers (or you're committed to a career with one), there are only a few places you really want to be. And, most of those major cities are either at least as expensive as DC (e.g. NYC, SF, Boston, LA), or their somewhat lower costs of living are offset by other quality of life considerations (e.g. weather, lack of public transit, etc.).

Also, few people seem to realize this, but prices in the DC metro are actually rising more slowly than the national average. In other words, many of those other less expensive cities are actually converging toward us, not the other way around.

[Anonymous]

I moved 7 years ago when my kids were 3 & 5. Small city in PA.
Advantages:
1. Lower cost of living. There is NO WAY I could afford the home I have now in DC. Or near DC. Or even not so near to DC. 4000 sq ft SFH, ½ acre backing to forest, in ground heated pool in a very nice neighborhood for under $400k.
2. Very little traffic. Parking is not an issue.
3. Activities for the kids are not hyper competitive.
4. DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia all 90 min – 2 hr drive. Can take train to NYC.
Disadvantages:
1. Not as many things to do ( I guess this can be an advantage – slower pace of life – but it takes time to get used to)
2. Not as many great restaurants. There are still diverse restraunts, so chances are whatever ethnic cuisine you want, you can find… but just not that many “wow!” restaurants.
3. Most people seem to have their set friendships from when they were younger, in college, etc. Hard for transplants to break into social scene. Most of my friends are not from the city I now live in (all transplants like me).

I’m in IT, go in with the federal government. Started as an 11 (foot in door), quickly picked up a 13 (based on previous experience, not TIG), now a 14.
The neighborhood I live in reminds me of my childhood – kids running around the neighborhood, no need for playdates – just walk outside. A lot of the kids in the neighborhood are on the same teams / clubs, so it’s very easy to carpool. Often, it’s now even planned –“hey, I can take Travis home if you want…”
The small city I am in does have a lot of ethnic diversity. It’s not a liberal bastion, but not conservative either – its moderate; HRC won in my district. It’s always very close in elections.
Is it perfect? No. It really took time to get used to small city mentality. The first couple years we traveled to DC and Baltimore and Philadelphia a lot. But as I embraced the slower pace of life, we stopped traveling to the cities as often. That and soccer season taking up the weekends (lol).
It is nice not to sit in traffic for hours. And to be able to buy a home instead of rent a townhome.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I moved 7 years ago when my kids were 3 & 5. Small city in PA.
Advantages:
1. Lower cost of living. There is NO WAY I could afford the home I have now in DC. Or near DC. Or even not so near to DC. 4000 sq ft SFH, ½ acre backing to forest, in ground heated pool in a very nice neighborhood for under $400k.
2. Very little traffic. Parking is not an issue.
3. Activities for the kids are not hyper competitive.
4. DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia all 90 min – 2 hr drive. Can take train to NYC.
Disadvantages:
1. Not as many things to do ( I guess this can be an advantage – slower pace of life – but it takes time to get used to)
2. Not as many great restaurants. There are still diverse restraunts, so chances are whatever ethnic cuisine you want, you can find… but just not that many “wow!” restaurants.
3. Most people seem to have their set friendships from when they were younger, in college, etc. Hard for transplants to break into social scene. Most of my friends are not from the city I now live in (all transplants like me).

I’m in IT, go in with the federal government. Started as an 11 (foot in door), quickly picked up a 13 (based on previous experience, not TIG), now a 14.
The neighborhood I live in reminds me of my childhood – kids running around the neighborhood, no need for playdates – just walk outside. A lot of the kids in the neighborhood are on the same teams / clubs, so it’s very easy to carpool. Often, it’s now even planned –“hey, I can take Travis home if you want…”
The small city I am in does have a lot of ethnic diversity. It’s not a liberal bastion, but not conservative either – its moderate; HRC won in my district. It’s always very close in elections.
Is it perfect? No. It really took time to get used to small city mentality. The first couple years we traveled to DC and Baltimore and Philadelphia a lot. But as I embraced the slower pace of life, we stopped traveling to the cities as often. That and soccer season taking up the weekends (lol).
It is nice not to sit in traffic for hours. And to be able to buy a home instead of rent a townhome.

Scranton?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I moved 7 years ago when my kids were 3 & 5. Small city in PA.
Advantages:
1. Lower cost of living. There is NO WAY I could afford the home I have now in DC. Or near DC. Or even not so near to DC. 4000 sq ft SFH, ½ acre backing to forest, in ground heated pool in a very nice neighborhood for under $400k.
2. Very little traffic. Parking is not an issue.
3. Activities for the kids are not hyper competitive.
4. DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia all 90 min – 2 hr drive. Can take train to NYC.
Disadvantages:
1. Not as many things to do ( I guess this can be an advantage – slower pace of life – but it takes time to get used to)
2. Not as many great restaurants. There are still diverse restraunts, so chances are whatever ethnic cuisine you want, you can find… but just not that many “wow!” restaurants.
3. Most people seem to have their set friendships from when they were younger, in college, etc. Hard for transplants to break into social scene. Most of my friends are not from the city I now live in (all transplants like me).

I’m in IT, go in with the federal government. Started as an 11 (foot in door), quickly picked up a 13 (based on previous experience, not TIG), now a 14.
The neighborhood I live in reminds me of my childhood – kids running around the neighborhood, no need for playdates – just walk outside. A lot of the kids in the neighborhood are on the same teams / clubs, so it’s very easy to carpool. Often, it’s now even planned –“hey, I can take Travis home if you want…”
The small city I am in does have a lot of ethnic diversity. It’s not a liberal bastion, but not conservative either – its moderate; HRC won in my district. It’s always very close in elections.
Is it perfect? No. It really took time to get used to small city mentality. The first couple years we traveled to DC and Baltimore and Philadelphia a lot. But as I embraced the slower pace of life, we stopped traveling to the cities as often. That and soccer season taking up the weekends (lol).
It is nice not to sit in traffic for hours. And to be able to buy a home instead of rent a townhome.

Scranton?

Sounds more like Harrisburg to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps upstate NY truly is cheaper, but be careful about assuming YOUR costs will be cheaper. I come from a western state that ostensibly is cheaper, but when I look at houses (neighborhoods) I would want to live in, the home cost is the same as here. Restaurants (decent, nothing fancy) are more expensive. Property taxes are less. Etc. We will probably retire out there, but not counting on it being cheaper.

Very valid point. I romanticized about moving out west, to Bozeman, MT, and when I looked at real estate prices, I realized it's really not that much cheaper. But where I'm from in upstate NY, I could get a nice house in a great school district for less than $200,000. I know that plenty of places are more expensive, but....200k! That's a downpayment around here.

There is also something to be said about a slower pace of life and not dealing with all of the BS that comes with our super Type A community in DC. I don't know if I can put a price on that.

+1. A lot of people on this forum seem to not realize that real estate prices have climbed in many other parts of the country. It’s like they think real estate is what it was when they were growing up. Even looking at my childhood home I was shocked how much it costs now.

You can probably find a less expensive house but for real estate to truly be MUCH cheaper means the job market in that area is limited and there is limited money to push up real estate prices. Also don’t discount moving from an area with public transportation to one where people have multiple cars per family. When driving around MCOL areas I’m always shocked at how most of the cars are new and fancy. It’s like instead of spending more on real estate they spend it on cars.

All, well, most areas have seen prices go up. It's called inflation. House prices probably doubled, on average, between 1999 and 2019. But they also did the same thing between 1979 and 1999. Actually, even more. My parents bought their house in a provincial city that's not one of the "hot" cities for 52k in 1976, sold it for 208k in 1994, bought another house for 300k and just sold that house for 650k. It's inflation. It's an upper middle class suburb with good schools.

Some cities (not all, but some) have seen higher than average real estate price increases. But the vast majority of the country remains much more affordable than DC.

^ totally this! I find it so weird how fatalistic people seem about living in DC - like they may as well not even explore other options because surely every place will have the same downsides and so why even bother.

there's a lot of nice places to live. lots cheaper than DC. DC is nice too but expensive.

Because JOBS

There are JOBS in other places. We have a sub 4% unemployment and a booming upper middle class across most American cities.

I think a lot of people get trapped into DC because of the artificially higher salaries paying 25-40% more for the same role than in, say, Atlanta or Minneapolis and are afraid to take bite the bullet and readjust to a lower salary even with a lower cost of living offsetting it.

In our case, and I know there are a lot of other people in the same situation, it's not that the same job would pay less in another place; it's that our types of jobs don't even exist anywhere else. I would love to move to Minneapolis or Omaha but I'm not really qualified to do anything there. It would take a lot of reworking of my resume to even attempt it, and with both my DH and I trying to do that, the job security just isn't there.

If you can't leave you can't leave. But I hear a lot of people who seem to act as if there's no possibility of ANYONE leaving DC because DC is where the jobs are, and it's just not the case.

People in Minneapolis are working. In Tampa they're working. In Providence. Why I bet you'd even find that out in other cities as well.

I think it's more complicated than those two extremes for many people. I know that in my field, there are plenty of places with one or two potential employers, but only a handful (maybe 6ish) of large cities with numerous potential employers. Unless you're happy to pack up and relocate every time you switch employers (or you're committed to a career with one), there are only a few places you really want to be. And, most of those major cities are either at least as expensive as DC (e.g. NYC, SF, Boston, LA), or their somewhat lower costs of living are offset by other quality of life considerations (e.g. weather, lack of public transit, etc.).

Also, few people seem to realize this, but prices in the DC metro are actually rising more slowly than the national average. In other words, many of those other less expensive cities are actually converging toward us, not the other way around.

The vast majority work at relatively generic jobs. You can be a doctor anywhere. Same for teachers. Engineers. Lawyers. Corporate America is chock full of generic management jobs. Project managers and program managers and marketing managers and business development roles are everywhere at every level in every city. There are not that many jobs in DC that are so specific to DC or specific to 1-2 major employers. Some, I'm sure. But not that many. People are just afraid to change jobs because of fear of change, of the efforts to pack up sticks and move to a new city where you don't know anyone. They just come up with a bunch of excuses but those excuses will only apply to a small number of people. Don't get me wrong, there's a whole non-profit, government, NGO sector unique to DC that makes finding equivalents elsewhere difficult but I'd wager 90% of the metro area works at jobs that can be found elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

The vast majority work at relatively generic jobs. You can be a doctor anywhere. Same for teachers. Engineers. Lawyers. Corporate America is chock full of generic management jobs. Project managers and program managers and marketing managers and business development roles are everywhere at every level in every city. There are not that many jobs in DC that are so specific to DC or specific to 1-2 major employers. Some, I'm sure. But not that many. People are just afraid to change jobs because of fear of change, of the efforts to pack up sticks and move to a new city where you don't know anyone. They just come up with a bunch of excuses but those excuses will only apply to a small number of people. Don't get me wrong, there's a whole non-profit, government, NGO sector unique to DC that makes finding equivalents elsewhere difficult but I'd wager 90% of the metro area works at jobs that can be found elsewhere.

Perhaps, but there tend to be MORE of those jobs here. If you work as an accountant and the business you work for goes under or has layoffs, there are a host of other businesses (not to mention government agencies) around here where you can get another job as an accountant. If you live in a small town with only a few big employers and you get laid off, your next stop may be a mom and pop shop with lower pay and fewer benefits. But you'll have an affordable house.

[Anonymous]

I'm interested in moving to Wilmington, NC or Virginia Beach, VA area. HHI in DC is $300k, with two mid level GS-15s. Were both CPAs as well but our entire career is in federal government. How can I make this happen? Need to keep HHI, as I need waterfront (river, bay, channel) is fine to keep boat, as well a built in pool. I also need highly rated schools.

[Anonymous]

"3. Most people seem to have their set friendships from when they were younger, in college, etc. Hard for transplants to break into social scene. Most of my friends are not from the city I now live in (all transplants like me). "

This is the hardest thing my sisters or I have found about leaving this area for another new one. We always took for granted new people coming in or out of a social scene, in our native Northern VA. We have not found it to be so in (the various other places any of us have lived): Chicago (mostly everyone is from SOMEwhere in the Midwest); Indianapolis; Philly/S. Jersey; Greenville, SC. One of us has lived off and on in London, though; we found that equally easy to meet new people who were OPEN to meeting new people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps upstate NY truly is cheaper, but be careful about assuming YOUR costs will be cheaper. I come from a western state that ostensibly is cheaper, but when I look at houses (neighborhoods) I would want to live in, the home cost is the same as here. Restaurants (decent, nothing fancy) are more expensive. Property taxes are less. Etc. We will probably retire out there, but not counting on it being cheaper.

Very valid point. I romanticized about moving out west, to Bozeman, MT, and when I looked at real estate prices, I realized it's really not that much cheaper. But where I'm from in upstate NY, I could get a nice house in a great school district for less than $200,000. I know that plenty of places are more expensive, but....200k! That's a downpayment around here.

There is also something to be said about a slower pace of life and not dealing with all of the BS that comes with our super Type A community in DC. I don't know if I can put a price on that.

+1. A lot of people on this forum seem to not realize that real estate prices have climbed in many other parts of the country. It’s like they think real estate is what it was when they were growing up. Even looking at my childhood home I was shocked how much it costs now.

You can probably find a less expensive house but for real estate to truly be MUCH cheaper means the job market in that area is limited and there is limited money to push up real estate prices. Also don’t discount moving from an area with public transportation to one where people have multiple cars per family. When driving around MCOL areas I’m always shocked at how most of the cars are new and fancy. It’s like instead of spending more on real estate they spend it on cars.

All, well, most areas have seen prices go up. It's called inflation. House prices probably doubled, on average, between 1999 and 2019. But they also did the same thing between 1979 and 1999. Actually, even more. My parents bought their house in a provincial city that's not one of the "hot" cities for 52k in 1976, sold it for 208k in 1994, bought another house for 300k and just sold that house for 650k. It's inflation. It's an upper middle class suburb with good schools.

Some cities (not all, but some) have seen higher than average real estate price increases. But the vast majority of the country remains much more affordable than DC.

^ totally this! I find it so weird how fatalistic people seem about living in DC - like they may as well not even explore other options because surely every place will have the same downsides and so why even bother.

there's a lot of nice places to live. lots cheaper than DC. DC is nice too but expensive.

Because JOBS

There are JOBS in other places. We have a sub 4% unemployment and a booming upper middle class across most American cities.

I think a lot of people get trapped into DC because of the artificially higher salaries paying 25-40% more for the same role than in, say, Atlanta or Minneapolis and are afraid to take bite the bullet and readjust to a lower salary even with a lower cost of living offsetting it.

I lived in a MCOL city like Atlanta. I’m not convinced it’s that much cheaper. A lot of these MCOL cities have a lifestyle of nicer cars, more travel, more furniture for your larger house, a SAHM etc.

If I moved to a MCOL city I’d make around 40 percent less and would have fewer job opportunities in the future. But I would probably only save 20-30 percent in living expenses.

However, we are close to 500k HHI and can afford to live well in DC. I think it may be a very different equation for someone making 150k HHI. I assume they are already out in the exurbs and moving to a city like Atlanta would only improve their quality of life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps upstate NY truly is cheaper, but be careful about assuming YOUR costs will be cheaper. I come from a western state that ostensibly is cheaper, but when I look at houses (neighborhoods) I would want to live in, the home cost is the same as here. Restaurants (decent, nothing fancy) are more expensive. Property taxes are less. Etc. We will probably retire out there, but not counting on it being cheaper.

Very valid point. I romanticized about moving out west, to Bozeman, MT, and when I looked at real estate prices, I realized it's really not that much cheaper. But where I'm from in upstate NY, I could get a nice house in a great school district for less than $200,000. I know that plenty of places are more expensive, but....200k! That's a downpayment around here.

There is also something to be said about a slower pace of life and not dealing with all of the BS that comes with our super Type A community in DC. I don't know if I can put a price on that.

+1. A lot of people on this forum seem to not realize that real estate prices have climbed in many other parts of the country. It’s like they think real estate is what it was when they were growing up. Even looking at my childhood home I was shocked how much it costs now.

You can probably find a less expensive house but for real estate to truly be MUCH cheaper means the job market in that area is limited and there is limited money to push up real estate prices. Also don’t discount moving from an area with public transportation to one where people have multiple cars per family. When driving around MCOL areas I’m always shocked at how most of the cars are new and fancy. It’s like instead of spending more on real estate they spend it on cars.

All, well, most areas have seen prices go up. It's called inflation. House prices probably doubled, on average, between 1999 and 2019. But they also did the same thing between 1979 and 1999. Actually, even more. My parents bought their house in a provincial city that's not one of the "hot" cities for 52k in 1976, sold it for 208k in 1994, bought another house for 300k and just sold that house for 650k. It's inflation. It's an upper middle class suburb with good schools.

Some cities (not all, but some) have seen higher than average real estate price increases. But the vast majority of the country remains much more affordable than DC.

^ totally this! I find it so weird how fatalistic people seem about living in DC - like they may as well not even explore other options because surely every place will have the same downsides and so why even bother.

there's a lot of nice places to live. lots cheaper than DC. DC is nice too but expensive.

Because JOBS

There are JOBS in other places. We have a sub 4% unemployment and a booming upper middle class across most American cities.

I think a lot of people get trapped into DC because of the artificially higher salaries paying 25-40% more for the same role than in, say, Atlanta or Minneapolis and are afraid to take bite the bullet and readjust to a lower salary even with a lower cost of living offsetting it.

In our case, and I know there are a lot of other people in the same situation, it's not that the same job would pay less in another place; it's that our types of jobs don't even exist anywhere else. I would love to move to Minneapolis or Omaha but I'm not really qualified to do anything there. It would take a lot of reworking of my resume to even attempt it, and with both my DH and I trying to do that, the job security just isn't there.

If you can't leave you can't leave. But I hear a lot of people who seem to act as if there's no possibility of ANYONE leaving DC because DC is where the jobs are, and it's just not the case.

People in Minneapolis are working. In Tampa they're working. In Providence. Why I bet you'd even find that out in other cities as well.

I think it's more complicated than those two extremes for many people. I know that in my field, there are plenty of places with one or two potential employers, but only a handful (maybe 6ish) of large cities with numerous potential employers. Unless you're happy to pack up and relocate every time you switch employers (or you're committed to a career with one), there are only a few places you really want to be. And, most of those major cities are either at least as expensive as DC (e.g. NYC, SF, Boston, LA), or their somewhat lower costs of living are offset by other quality of life considerations (e.g. weather, lack of public transit, etc.).

Also, few people seem to realize this, but prices in the DC metro are actually rising more slowly than the national average. In other words, many of those other less expensive cities are actually converging toward us, not the other way around.

This.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

The vast majority work at relatively generic jobs. You can be a doctor anywhere. Same for teachers. Engineers. Lawyers. Corporate America is chock full of generic management jobs. Project managers and program managers and marketing managers and business development roles are everywhere at every level in every city. There are not that many jobs in DC that are so specific to DC or specific to 1-2 major employers. Some, I'm sure. But not that many. People are just afraid to change jobs because of fear of change, of the efforts to pack up sticks and move to a new city where you don't know anyone. They just come up with a bunch of excuses but those excuses will only apply to a small number of people. Don't get me wrong, there's a whole non-profit, government, NGO sector unique to DC that makes finding equivalents elsewhere difficult but I'd wager 90% of the metro area works at jobs that can be found elsewhere.

Perhaps, but there tend to be MORE of those jobs here. If you work as an accountant and the business you work for goes under or has layoffs, there are a host of other businesses (not to mention government agencies) around here where you can get another job as an accountant. If you live in a small town with only a few big employers and you get laid off, your next stop may be a mom and pop shop with lower pay and fewer benefits. But you'll have an affordable house.



That's fine. This thread is for people who will trade a lower cost of living for a little more risk.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Perhaps upstate NY truly is cheaper, but be careful about assuming YOUR costs will be cheaper. I come from a western state that ostensibly is cheaper, but when I look at houses (neighborhoods) I would want to live in, the home cost is the same as here. Restaurants (decent, nothing fancy) are more expensive. Property taxes are less. Etc. We will probably retire out there, but not counting on it being cheaper.

Very valid point. I romanticized about moving out west, to Bozeman, MT, and when I looked at real estate prices, I realized it's really not that much cheaper. But where I'm from in upstate NY, I could get a nice house in a great school district for less than $200,000. I know that plenty of places are more expensive, but....200k! That's a downpayment around here.

There is also something to be said about a slower pace of life and not dealing with all of the BS that comes with our super Type A community in DC. I don't know if I can put a price on that.

+1. A lot of people on this forum seem to not realize that real estate prices have climbed in many other parts of the country. It’s like they think real estate is what it was when they were growing up. Even looking at my childhood home I was shocked how much it costs now.

You can probably find a less expensive house but for real estate to truly be MUCH cheaper means the job market in that area is limited and there is limited money to push up real estate prices. Also don’t discount moving from an area with public transportation to one where people have multiple cars per family. When driving around MCOL areas I’m always shocked at how most of the cars are new and fancy. It’s like instead of spending more on real estate they spend it on cars.

All, well, most areas have seen prices go up. It's called inflation. House prices probably doubled, on average, between 1999 and 2019. But they also did the same thing between 1979 and 1999. Actually, even more. My parents bought their house in a provincial city that's not one of the "hot" cities for 52k in 1976, sold it for 208k in 1994, bought another house for 300k and just sold that house for 650k. It's inflation. It's an upper middle class suburb with good schools.

Some cities (not all, but some) have seen higher than average real estate price increases. But the vast majority of the country remains much more affordable than DC.

^ totally this! I find it so weird how fatalistic people seem about living in DC - like they may as well not even explore other options because surely every place will have the same downsides and so why even bother.

there's a lot of nice places to live. lots cheaper than DC. DC is nice too but expensive.

Because JOBS

There are JOBS in other places. We have a sub 4% unemployment and a booming upper middle class across most American cities.

I think a lot of people get trapped into DC because of the artificially higher salaries paying 25-40% more for the same role than in, say, Atlanta or Minneapolis and are afraid to take bite the bullet and readjust to a lower salary even with a lower cost of living offsetting it.

I lived in a MCOL city like Atlanta. I’m not convinced it’s that much cheaper. A lot of these MCOL cities have a lifestyle of nicer cars, more travel, more furniture for your larger house, a SAHM etc.

If I moved to a MCOL city I’d make around 40 percent less and would have fewer job opportunities in the future. But I would probably only save 20-30 percent in living expenses.

However, we are close to 500k HHI and can afford to live well in DC. I think it may be a very different equation for someone making 150k HHI. I assume they are already out in the exurbs and moving to a city like Atlanta would only improve their quality of life.

I think we established early in the thread that if you are very well off you probably aren't on here asking what it's like moving to a cheaper city.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Perhaps upstate NY truly is cheaper, but be careful about assuming YOUR costs will be cheaper. I come from a western state that ostensibly is cheaper, but when I look at houses (neighborhoods) I would want to live in, the home cost is the same as here. Restaurants (decent, nothing fancy) are more expensive. Property taxes are less. Etc. We will probably retire out there, but not counting on it being cheaper.

Very valid point. I romanticized about moving out west, to Bozeman, MT, and when I looked at real estate prices, I realized it's really not that much cheaper. But where I'm from in upstate NY, I could get a nice house in a great school district for less than $200,000. I know that plenty of places are more expensive, but....200k! That's a downpayment around here.

There is also something to be said about a slower pace of life and not dealing with all of the BS that comes with our super Type A community in DC. I don't know if I can put a price on that.

+1. A lot of people on this forum seem to not realize that real estate prices have climbed in many other parts of the country. It’s like they think real estate is what it was when they were growing up. Even looking at my childhood home I was shocked how much it costs now.

You can probably find a less expensive house but for real estate to truly be MUCH cheaper means the job market in that area is limited and there is limited money to push up real estate prices. Also don’t discount moving from an area with public transportation to one where people have multiple cars per family. When driving around MCOL areas I’m always shocked at how most of the cars are new and fancy. It’s like instead of spending more on real estate they spend it on cars.

All, well, most areas have seen prices go up. It's called inflation. House prices probably doubled, on average, between 1999 and 2019. But they also did the same thing between 1979 and 1999. Actually, even more. My parents bought their house in a provincial city that's not one of the "hot" cities for 52k in 1976, sold it for 208k in 1994, bought another house for 300k and just sold that house for 650k. It's inflation. It's an upper middle class suburb with good schools.

Some cities (not all, but some) have seen higher than average real estate price increases. But the vast majority of the country remains much more affordable than DC.

^ totally this! I find it so weird how fatalistic people seem about living in DC - like they may as well not even explore other options because surely every place will have the same downsides and so why even bother.

there's a lot of nice places to live. lots cheaper than DC. DC is nice too but expensive.

Because JOBS

There are JOBS in other places. We have a sub 4% unemployment and a booming upper middle class across most American cities.

I think a lot of people get trapped into DC because of the artificially higher salaries paying 25-40% more for the same role than in, say, Atlanta or Minneapolis and are afraid to take bite the bullet and readjust to a lower salary even with a lower cost of living offsetting it.

I lived in a MCOL city like Atlanta. I’m not convinced it’s that much cheaper. A lot of these MCOL cities have a lifestyle of nicer cars, more travel, more furniture for your larger house, a SAHM etc.

If I moved to a MCOL city I’d make around 40 percent less and would have fewer job opportunities in the future. But I would probably only save 20-30 percent in living expenses.

However, we are close to 500k HHI and can afford to live well in DC. I think it may be a very different equation for someone making 150k HHI. I assume they are already out in the exurbs and moving to a city like Atlanta would only improve their quality of life.

Probably true. If you're in the 400-500k bracket then in Atlanta you'd be looking at Buckhead and similar, with a high cost of living. You'd save money at cheaper private school tuition, and maybe get a bigger house for your money, but car costs are the same, travel costs the same, daily expenditures are the same, so your net savings improvement isn't going to be that much.

But it's a very different story for the sub 200k incomes. And that's most people.