As readers of this blog probably know, I've moved to the East coast (Boston area to be precise) after living in Seattle for 13 years. Jaimee and I moved here in order to be closer to our families. Nearly all our family members live in Southern Vermont and Eastern Massachusetts so we made the decision to move here in order to be closer to them. And so far we've taken advantage of the proximity and enjoyed (just in the last two months):
- the birth of my sister's son (and my first nephew) Jonah
- two of Jaimee's cousin's weddings
- my uncle's 70th birthday party
- Jaimee's cousin's baby's 1st birthday party
- being able to visit with Jonah at least once a week, and often two or more times in a week
- a week-long vacation to Nantucket with Jaimee's dad and step-mom
- frequent visits with Jaimee's sister who lives in Somerville
- a long-weekend to Martha's Vineyard with my aunt and uncle
- numerous other family functions, including visits with Jaimee's octogenarian grand-parents
This has been great, and we've enjoyed it very much. If we still lived in Seattle we might have come back for maybe a few of those events, but certainly not all of them.
However, for reasons I won't get into in this post, Boston is much more expensive than Seattle. I won't speak for all people, but at least for us, we're finding Boston to be loads more expensive than Seattle. In other words, it's costing us a certain amount to live here instead of Seattle. I've been thinking about this a lot lately, as we've been apartment hunting and we realized that the rents here are quite a bit more expensive than Seattle. And rents are just one way it's costing us more to live here. So, I thought I'd try and quantify how much more expensive Boston is than Seattle (again, for us - other's situations might be very different):
Rent: In Seattle, we had ridiculously cheap rent. Granted, the apartment wasn't very good, but it was very, very cheap. It was $730 a month including utilities. The starting level for even the cheapest apartment we've seen in Boston is about $1,000 without utilities. And utility prices will be higher because of the cold winters. One apartment we looked at had heating oil costs of $2,000 per year! But to be conservative, let's just say we'll be spending an extra $350 per month on housing as it's likely our rent would have gone up (it went from $600 to $730 in the three years in that apartment). Cost: $4,000 per year.
Income: Jaimee and I were both lucky to have well-paying jobs in Seattle, and I'll be the first to admit I was overpaid. I had a very, very good job. There are jobs that pay the same around Boston, but they come with lots more responsibility, and there are many that I'm not qualified for. I'm looking at probably about a $10,000 to $15,000 per year decrease in pay. My old job had zero benefits (I was an independent contractor) so the benefit package (and my new employer picking up half my Social Security tax) should make up for some of that figure, but I still figure I'll be making about $10,000 less per year. Jaimee has decided to not go back to teaching this year and will be a full-time nanny, taking care of two babies (one of them my nephew) four days a week. Her salary for this will be about $10,000 a year less than her teaching job in Seattle. Granted, it's four days a week (although still 40 hours), and it will be a less stressful job, but she also will not have two to three months off in the Summer. Cost: $20,000 per year.
Insurance: I've already detailed how much more expensive health insurance is in Massachusetts. I'm pretty much ignoring the state mandate that I get health insurance and am waiting for the benefits of my job, so for me it's a wash (although the higher cost of insurance probably factors into the lower wage I'll be making) but for Jaimee the higher costs might be real, depending on how much of the insurance costs her new employers pick up. We don't have the figures for her yet, but I wouldn't be surprised if insurance for Jaimee costs upward of $200 more per month. (There's also the fact that I won't be able to keep my health savings account which saved me about $1,000 a year in taxes, but I also will have the money I contributed into the account for other stuff.) Car insurance is about the same, but that might be because we registered the car in central Mass as opposed to the city of Boston. We paid $600 every six months for two cars in Seattle as opposed to $300 for just one car here (although the insurance we had in Seattle was more comprehensive). Cost: $2,000+ per year.
Entertainment: We ate out a lot in Seattle, and although we don't eat out quite so much (so far anyway) when we have it's been cheaper in Boston, maybe 15% or so. For one, sales tax is less (6% versus nearly 10%) but prices are also less, at least in Boston itself. Interestingly, in the suburbs, restaurants are much more expensive than Seattle, but we hardly ever eat out in the suburbs. Alcohol costs more at the liquor stores (it's hard to find any microbrew six-pack for less than $10, for example), so that might eat into some of our savings, but conservatively, I'd say we're saving about $100 to $200 per month on eating out/entertainment costs, both by not eating out as much and by it being cheaper when we do eat out. Savings: $1,500 per year.
Miscellaneous costs: We've had various miscellaneous costs, like registering the car ($125 for two years), getting the car inspected ($30 per year), getting a MA driver's license ($100 for five years), but I won't count those as we'd probably have comparable expenses in Seattle. What I will count is tolls. Massachusetts has lots of tolls. Granted we might be driving around more than we will once we have jobs, but I got an EZ-Pass contraption for the car to go through the automated booths and I've been spending an average of about $20 per month on tolls. There are also commuting costs associated with my new job. In Seattle I rode my bike to work all but maybe five days per year, and the days I didn't ride my bike I drove the five miles and parked for free. In Boston, I will try to bike when the weather is good, but otherwise I will probably have to take public transport at $1.70 each way. Jaimee will probably either drive to work (less distance than she did in Seattle) or walk (depending on how close we live to where she has to Nanny). Costs: $600 per year.
Miscellaneous savings: As noted, sales tax is less here, and there is no sales tax on shoes and clothing like there is in Washington, so that might save us some money. Neither Jaimee nor I buy very many clothes, but the lower sales tax does save us some, I just don't know how much. But, let's say it saves us $20 a month. We also don't have to spend money to travel back to Boston, which we'd been averaging about twice every three years or so. Tickets averaged about $350 round-trip per person, with a few hundred in spending money. Of course, we'll take other vacations instead, so it's not a true savings, but I'll add it in here anyway. Savings: $1,250 per year.
So if you add up the costs and subtract the savings, it costs us $24,000 per year to live in Boston. Hmmmm...that implies we could have stayed in Seattle and flown back to Boston every other weekend (assuming a cost of $1,000 per trip including airfare). Think of all the frequent flyer miles we could have racked up. Luckily, most of my family doesn't read this blog so they won't now think I only think of them in terms of dollars. On second thought, the fact that I did move back here proves I don't think of them only in terms of dollars, and it shows that I value being around them at upwards of $2,000 per month! That's quite a price for being close to family!
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