New York City has long been one of the most expensive cities in the world, but its price tag has only become heftier in recent years with housing prices and inflation.
The median apartment rent in the city hit record highs last year and are estimated to be 17% higher than they were before the pandemic. The median asking rent as of June is $3,800, 1.7% higher than a year prior, according to NYC real estate company StreetEasy.
The affordability crisis in the city is so bad that half of families can’t afford to live there, according to a 2023 paper published biennially by the local United Way and Fund for the City of New York. The report claims that families across all five boroughs need to earn an average of $100,000 a year to afford housing, food, transportation, and any unexpected costs. That might be even higher depending on where in the city they live; those average earnings need to be $150,000 for a family of four in lower Manhattan, per the report.
Yet, the median household income in NYC is just $76,607. NYC’s cost of living is a big reason why the city has always been a transient one, with people constantly trickling in and out. The pandemic spurred what seemed to be a mass exodus, but migration patterns have since righted pre-pandemic levels.
Three people, under pseudonyms to protect their privacy, share their stories of why they left the skyscrapers behind and how it changed their monthly budgets. While they pay more for some things, like transportation, they’re also cutting back on other expenses, which allows them to save more for goals like retirement and a house. The consensus: While they miss the convenience of NYC, they don’t miss the cost of living.
“I have a grown-up refrigerator now”
A couple in their 50s swapped the big city for life upstate when the pandemic hit
Monthly Expenses
Take-home household income:
NYC: $10,000
Hudson Valley: $10,000
Rent:
NYC: $2,000
Hudson Valley: $3,200
Transportation:
NYC: $100
Hudson Valley: $600
Groceries:
NYC: $250
Hudson Valley: $250
Eating out:
NYC: $400
Hudson Valley: $300
Clothing:
NYC: $200-plus
Hudson Valley: $100
After living in Manhattan for 35 years, John and his wife finally decided to leave their 500-square-foot apartment behind in 2021. “COVID hit, and we were both working from home in our small apartment,” he says. “It just did not work.”
They moved to a Hudson Valley town where John says they’re living the best of both worlds, enjoying a lower cost of living upstate with access to more outdoor activities, but close enough to the city that they can take the train down on the weekends.
While they’re no longer paying city taxes, they’re still bringing in around $10,000 a month after taxes because John’s job situation has changed since COVID and he’s now earning less than he used to (he and his wife work in sales and advertising, respectively).
They were fortunate enough to live in a rent-stabilized apartment for $2,000 in Manhattan, so they ended up paying $1,200 more in rent when they moved into their upstate condo. But at 1,250-square-feet, they’re getting much more space for their money (cutting the price they’re paying per square foot in half). They’re also spending about $500 more in transportation costs after swapping out a metrocard for a leased car.
Regardless, they’ve been able to save a lot more—enough to pay off $10,000 in debt and increase their retirement savings by 25% each month—“because the temptations aren’t there,” John says.
He misses the convenience and walkability of NYC, but that’s exactly what put him in temptation’s way. He says he often fell victim to the city’s $20 tax—the theory that you can’t step outside without spending money. Buying new clothes in particular was hard to resist, which he says has since dropped by at least $100 in his monthly budget.
“No access to Starbucks means you’re not buying a $5 coffee every morning. I save so much by not buying every single meal or drink item during the week now,” he says, adding that since his wife works from home, there are weeks she doesn’t spend a dime outside of groceries.
Having more space at home means more room for food, so he also saves money by making lunch every day instead of eating out. Their old apartment had a half fridge, so they only bought a small amount of groceries. Now, they have the room to buy more food at a time. “I can shop for the week. I have a grown-up refrigerator,” he says.
That leaves his monthly grocery budget around the same: While groceries were pricier in Manhattan, he buys more in bulk, offsetting the price difference—but this means that, as with his housing situation, he gets more for his money. And his eating out budget has gone down, he adds.
“New York, especially now, is just not sustainable for anyone,” he says. “It’s just very, very expensive.”
“I no longer live paycheck to paycheck”
A 30-something moved south for a slower pace and warmer weather
Monthly Expenses
Take-home household income:
NYC: less than $8,000
Charleston: $11,000
Housing:
NYC: $2,200 in rent
Charleston: $2,600 in mortgage, which she splits with her husband
Retirement and savings:
NYC: $700
Charleston: $4,400 – $5,500
Transportation:
NYC: $300
Charleston: $500
After six years of life in New York, Ashley moved to Charleston in 2018 for a slower paced lifestyle, better work-life balance, and a lower cost of living —“but mostly to be in warmer weather,” she says. While she misses “silly nostalgic things like Christmastime in the city and a great slice of pizza,” she has no regrets.
“I work remotely and don’t have to commute by subway everyday, I know all of my neighbors by name, I spend more time at the beach than anywhere else, I have a dog who loves the beach as much as I do, and I stopped dating and met my now-husband,” she says.
The lower cost of living also helped her save enough money over the course of three years to buy a 2,400 square-foot single family house, which doesn’t cost much more a month than she was paying for a one-bedroom in the Upper West Side for $2,200. She splits her $2,600 mortgage with her husband, who she hasn’t yet combined finances with.
They pay about $400 a month total in utilities. In NYC, her utilities varied a lot—she says they were “almost nothing” in the spring and fall and “astronomical” in the winter and summer. Her transportation costs have gone slightly up—while she no longer pays $300 a month on a subway card and random Ubers, she now spends $500 a month on a car payment and insurance.
After taxes while living in NYC, she netted less than $8,000 a month working in human resources in financial services. She now works the same job remotely, taking home $11,000 a month in Charleston. While taxes are less in North Carolina and she no longer has to pay a city tax, the increase in income is also due to a promotion and small cost of living raises. It allows her to save and invest 40% to 50% of her paycheck a month, she says, adding that she typically only socked away less than 10% a month in NYC.
Her discretionary expenses varied a lot on a month-to-month basis in NYC. “I was a hermit from January through March, but rented a summer house June through August,” she explains.
She spends about $400 a month on groceries now, and while she didn’t track her expenses too closely while living in NYC, she thinks she was spending much more than that between groceries and “lots of seamless food deliveries.” Since Charleston is a big foodie city, she says she eats out more than she did in NYC but the tabs are less expensive overall.
She definitely pays less for entertainment now, she says, pointing out that it costs her $9 to see a movie at the theater versus $25 in NYC. Plus, a lot of activities she does—like beach and boat days and kayaking or paddle boarding—are free.
“I no longer live paycheck to paycheck like in NYC,” she says.
“I was just moving my salary from my boss to my landlord”
A 20-something fed up with post-pandemic rent prices headed to Austin
Monthly Expenses
Take-home household income:
NYC: $7,250
Austin: $8,250
Rent:
NYC: $2,200
Austin: $1,300
Transportation:
NYC: $125
Austin: $200
Groceries:
NYC:
$300
Austin: $230
Retirement savings:
NYC:
$1,625
Austin: $1,916
Dean moved to Manhattan during its pandemic era of affordable rent in 2021. But after a year-and-a-half, he decided to call it quits when rents shot back up. He says the balance of working remotely at a tech start-up in such an expensive city wasn’t working for him anymore.
“It just came down to: I didn’t have to be there,” he says. “I feel like the people that thrived there had a really good career reason.”
So, he moved to Austin last year, where he says “the cost of living difference is real,” pocketing an extra $1,000 a month thanks to the tax difference in his paycheck alone. In NYC, he was paying $2,200 a month for a flex bedroom (when a living space is divided into two with a temporary wall) with one roommate. Now, he’s paying $1,300 a month for a 2,000-square-foot house near downtown Austin with two roommates.
He misses the walkability of NYC and the subway compared to Austin, where he bought a car. While it’s paid off, he’s paying $150 for insurance and $50 in gas a month—slightly more than the monthly $125 he was shelling out for a metrocard in NYC.
He says his daily costs are much cheaper, and that he spends about 25% less a month on groceries. Although eating out in Austin is more affordable, this entices him to spend more on it than he did in NYC.
“I felt like in NYC, I was pinched more. I enjoy eating out and going out, so when I moved to Austin, I kind of let that part of my budget go,” he says. “I’m spending an extra $300 or so a month on stuff like eating out, vacations, and entertainment that I wouldn’t spend in NYC just because I have some extra space in my budget.”
He says he’s also able to save more of his disposable income, with his eyes set on homeownership in the next few years. It feels attainable in Austin, “whereas in NYC, I felt like I was just moving my salary from my boss to my landlord and saving very little,” he says.
He no longer budgets that strictly “because I don’t feel pressed about affording things anymore, and I just stay below my means,” he says, adding that it’s also been easier to make friends in Austin.
One thing that’s remained the same—he’s always maxed out his 401(k) contributions no matter where he lived, increasing his monthly spend for that as the 401(k) limits increase.
For the same lifestyle (with a much bigger place) in Austin, he says it’s overall an extra $2,500 a month in my pocket and a place that suits him better. “I actually really liked the lifestyle in Austin,” he says. “So I don’t feel like I gave up part of my life for extra savings each month. Just ignoring money, it was probably a better place for me anyways.”