What does it cost to live in America?

[maycocksean]

I’ve always assumed that because we don’t pay for car or housing here in the CNMI that we’re actually doing better financially here than we would in the States, even with the pittance we make in our jobs as missionaries here.

Well, with our son on the way, I’ve been feeling like I need to find out if that’s really true. I’m beginning to feel like we might move back to the Mainland in another year or two and I want to start getting a sense of what that might be like. A first step of course would be to know if we really are doing better here than in the U.S.

So here’s how you can help. I want to provide a typical monthly budget (similar to the one we use here but with the additional mainland expensese of car and house added) and invite you to fill in the blanks telling me how much you think a family of three would spend on these items. I’m also not sure what the take home is for a teacher in the U.S. these days so if any of you have any insight on that, please let me know too. (And again I’m only interested in net, NOT gross income. Income amounts before taxes and such is useless to me). I recognize that this information will vary by region of the country but that actually is useful to me to see how expenses vary from place to place. (Right now we’ve been leaning towards Oregon).

So here it is and thanks for any and all that are willing to participate:

Food:
Gas:
Rent/Mortgage Payment:
Car Payment:
Car Insurance:
Utilities:
Phone/Internet:
Cell Phone:
Baby Expenses (Diapers et al):
Clothing:

That’s all I can think of. There are other expenses loan payments and credit card debt and such but those expenses will be the same in the U.S. as they are here.

 

[corianderstem]

Oregon is beautiful.

Unfortunately, I can't tell you much about the cost of living there. I believe it's lower than Seattle, but that's not saying too much.

Car insurance depends on a few things - the age of the car, how much coverage you want, etc. I pay $150 quarterly, but my car is fairly old and I only have bare-bones coverage on it.

 

[Doozer61]

Depends on where you want to live in Oregon. I am mostly familiar with central Oregon (Bend). It is a high desert community and my step daughter and her family live there.

They currently rent a 3 bedroom house in a nice area for $900 month. They have 3 kids and both of them work. Gas there is about .15 cents less per gallon than here so I think it's about $1.75 right now. The utilities are what gets them, especially in the winter because it can get cold there.

The cool thing about Oregon is that there is no sales tax.

We have purchased cameras and other big items there as well because here sales tax is 8.75%.

That's about all I can say Sean. Hope it helps a little.

 

[ramblin rose]

Gas there is about .15 cents less per gallon than here so I think it's about $1.75 right now.

Are you talking about gasoline? I'm guessing you mean $3.75 not $1.75 right?

 

[sue4u2]

Are you talking about gasoline? I'm guessing you mean $3.75 not $1.75 right?

Yeah, I was about to gather up some 50 gallon drums and head to Oregon.

I'm in the south(Alabama).

I paid $2.51 per gallon the day before yesterday to fill up.
3 bedroom house's would run about $900 a month also.
groceries go up expodentially with the price of gas - as does everything else
my 2 bedroom apartment runs about $100 a month for power bills (all electric) except from this month on - it will be anywhere from $150 to $200 untill after October. But it's really, really hot here in the summer - and you may have to run from a hurricane or 2 or 3. Katrina was way too close to us, massive damage and I had to relocate 2 other times that year because of hurricanes.
A 2 car family will pay around $80.00 to $100 a mo (per car) or higher depending on the amount of coverage you take out.
Phone coverage starts around $40.00 for basic service and if you bundle long distance, internet and cable with your phone, you will pay around $100 a mo - not high speed - but DSL. add in $25.00 more for high sp.- and up to $40.00 more (monthly) for special cable stations.
Clothing, cell phones etc, depends on if you have anything left over after the Baby expenses.
If you move to the south - stay up in the northern sections.
You won't have the relocation expenses. But then again you won't have easy access to our beautiful beaches either.
there's no doubt - Southern Alabama and the panhandle of Florida have the most beautiful beaches in the world.
Hope that helps..
Yall come back now - ya here.

 

[martha]

So here it is and thanks for any and all that are willing to participate:


Phone/Internet:
Cell Phone:

These are the only two I know anything about.

Our land line is 30 clams per month, and our broadband/cable bill is 85 and change per month.

Cell for the two of us is 93 per month, but that's with unlimited texting and pix because we like that kind of thing. We also have unlimited long distance and a bunch of minutes that we don't use except in the summer when we each take off in different directions.

Oh, and my closest gas station is selling the elixir for $3.82 per gallon. Dearer than blood, I imagine.

 

[david]

I haven't seen gas for $1.75 since the year 2001.

It's been a long time.

 

[Mr. BAW]

Gas was $1.75 when Doozer's car was crashed; it was $4.05 when she got it back from the shop...

 

[the tourist]

I paid $2.51 per gallon the day before yesterday to fill up.

The dirt-cheap stuff to the north of Seattle by a half hour is $3.61 per gallon!

 

[maycocksean]

All those gas prices sound great to me. We're at $4.32 and climbing here in Saipan. I expect we'll $5.00 a gallon before the end of the year.

Right now I spend about $180 a month in gas. ($60 of which is a subsidy from the school for school related gas usage as various employees use "our" car during the school day for school business).

(And Saipan is essentially all "city driving" since there are no highways).

 

[deep]

i'll give it a shot


Food: $100 - $125 a week, best to look for a local produce co op and buy locally grown veggies and fruit
Gas: $50 a week ($4 a gallon, 12000 miles a year at 20 miles a gallon)
Rent/Mortgage Payment: $900 - $1100 a month
Car Payment: $350 a month
Car Insurance: $1000 a year
Utilities: $150 - $250 a month, more in winter
Phone/Internet: $100 a month
Cell Phone: $80 a month
Baby Expenses (Diapers et al): $200 a month
Clothing: $200 a month

 

[Lila64]

Have you thought about getting health insurance? Self-employed here, with a husband and teenage daughter. About $800 a month, and a $2500 deductible. Pretty soon it will cost me more for insurance than my house payment

Don't move to California - it's too expensive
The cheap gas at the local station here is $3.93 for cash, $3.99 for creditcard.

Car insurance will depend on where you live, the age of your car, coverage, distance you drive to/from work, driving record...

 

[the tourist]

Clothing: $200 a month

Really? I don't spend that much in 2 years on clothing.

 

[GirlsAloudFan]

Clothing: $200 a month

I thought the same thing that the Tourist just said, Deep, although I think that the rest of your numbers are mostly accurate and reasonable.

I don't think I've spent $200 on clothes in the last year, let alone one month.

$200 a month for clothes....are you James Bond?

 

[Carek1230]

All I can say is no matter where you live nowadays with the rising gas prices everything's following suit and costs on everything seems to rise on a daily basis. When's it gonna stop?

 

[Liesje]

West Michigan is INSANELY CHEAP for housing. On the other hand, we have the worst housing market, unemployment, and economy in the entire country.

This is what Phil and I pay. No kids, 5 animals (I'm not including their costs of food). I pay everything but Phil's phone and car insurance (he works part time to cover those two bills). I make less than the national average and I think we live comfortably. We have less than a month's cost in savings, but no car payments or credit card debt. About 100K in student debt, which I pay $440/mo on (just my loans, Phil's are in deferment).

Food: $250/mo??
Gas: for cars? $3.70 yesterday
Rent/Mortgage Payment: rent - $625/mo (refundable deposit $1025)
Car Payment: none, we drive junkers worth less than $2000 together
Car Insurance: about $100/mo for 2 cars on PLPD, this includes our renter's insurance
Utilities: electricity averages $60/mo and gas is like $120 in the winter and $40 or less in the summer
Phone/Internet: Internet and cable bundle is $66/mo, no phone
Cell Phone: Phil's is $40, mine is free b/c it's a work phone
Baby Expenses (Diapers et al): n/a
Clothing: maybe $25/mo when averaged out. I bought a lot of new clothes recently b/c of weight loss but I don't shop high-end

 

[LarryMullen's POPAngel]

Clothing: $200 a month

Change that to shoes and makeup for some of us.

Michigan is fairly cheap, so as a single girl with no health insurance, I get by ok.

I got a steal on my new lease - my payment and insurance just both went down about $30 each, my rent is ridiculously low compared to some others, and I go grocery shopping about once a month.

 

[corianderstem]

Considering Sean is going to have a young child who's going to grow pretty quickly, I think $200/month for clothing isn't all that outrageous.

Maybe it's too high an estimate, though, especially if you can find a consignment shop that has gently used baby clothes.

 

[Lila64]

Change that to shoes and makeup for some of us.

Michigan is fairly cheap, so as a single girl with no health insurance, I get by ok.

I got a steal on my new lease - my payment and insurance just both went down about $30 each, my rent is ridiculously low compared to some others, and I go grocery shopping about once a month.

No health insurance?

 

[LarryMullen's POPAngel]

No health insurance?

Nope.

 

[BoMac]

Move to Canada, yo. Everyone has health insurance!

 

[LarryMullen's POPAngel]

Move to Canada, yo. Everyone has health insurance!

 

[beegee]

Nope.

When I was "newly single" I went about six years without health insurance

 

[Lila64]

Nope.

Your job doesn't offer it to you?

I'd probably be dead without insurance. Or living in a box

Back in the early 80s, before I was dating my now husband, he had gotten sick, had no insurance, and went to the hospital. He had symptoms of appendicitis (white/red cell count), but was sent home. Felt sicker during the night, and went to the ER and they performed an emergency appendectomy. At the time (early 80s), the cost to him was $5000 and he just had to charge it and pay it off. I'm scared to think what that would cost now.

 

[Angela Harlem]

Sean, seriously, consider Australia, dude. The cost of living in the US is insane and out dollar is fairly comparable currently.


Oh, and you'd also have your baby for free here and get a nice little $5k bonus payment for your wife's um.. labours. lol.

 

[sue4u2]

The dirt-cheap stuff to the north of Seattle by a half hour is $3.61 per gallon!

$2.51 isn't what I paid, geez - it's so high I think my brain wouldn't let me type it.
I paid $3.51 per gal - duh.

 

[the tourist]

Considering Sean is going to have a young child who's going to grow pretty quickly, I think $200/month for clothing isn't all that outrageous.

Maybe it's too high an estimate, though, especially if you can find a consignment shop that has gently used baby clothes.

There is a chain in Washington called Other Mothers which my sister-in-law has used well where you can find baby-clothes for extremely cheap (and in very, very good condition). It makes no sense to me to buy everything new for a baby since it's going to be grown out of so quickly--maybe a few things, but you would probably get a bunch of infant stuff at a baby shower.

 

[Doozer61]

Gas was $1.75 when Doozer's car was crashed; it was $4.05 when she got it back from the shop...

very funny

 

[MrPryck2U]

Haven't you heard?

Its free to live in America... and the streets are paved with gold.

I've been living without health insurance for 12 years. Know what my plan is? Don't get sick.

 

[MandyMarie]

Oh, and you'd also have your baby for free here and get a nice little $5k bonus payment for your wife's um.. labours. lol.

Damn, I should've moved to Australia when I had my three kids. I deserved a bonus payment for my last kid especially, the little butterball was 9 lbs 11 oz.