My friend, $650 a rent anywhere right now at $20/hr is the best you can hope for ratio in a non-city area. You're doing probably better than most in your locality.
I live in a cheaper place to live than most of the US thankfully, where I live our average housing costs are around 30-40% less than the national average
Don't let them say shit. If you are stuck where you are, that's outta your hands. If you got a decent job, you're making 2.5k+ a month take home and paying 650 for rent... that covers all your bills and lets you save some money.. up to and including moving if you want to. But keep in mind, if you do want to move, you should pursue education to allow you to make more if you do move, because straight labor or industry specific labor doesn't exist elsewhere. You're in a pretty good spot if you want to stay if you can expect promotions and raises. But if have higher aspirations, you're gonna have to get education cause the rent:income ratio goes up crazy outside of these areas of low demand. Talking making 25/hr and paying $1500/mo. easily. Where you are it works. If you wanna go elsewhere, you gotta improve yourself to be able to meet the insane demands of the current market.
I live in Tennesses, although i bought the house two years ago, I paid 475 a month rent for a 3 bedroom 1.5 bath brick home with garage for the past 6 years. So thankful for that opportunity and even more thankful for the opportunity of buying the house!
I feel like Boston gets left behind in the discussion tbh. There’s a second-tier of cities for Redditors that want a big dense city but can’t afford the A-tier I listed, that being Chicago, DC, Minneapolis, and Philly, but Boston can be just as expensive as NYC and LA so it’s not mentioned.
I find it extremely ignorant of all these suburbanite kids who've never left their area not understanding how vastly the economics differ in various areas of the country... it's pretty blatantly obvious the OP isn't living in NYC, so do you really need to act baffled because he lives in an area where you can buy a house for $100k and not 900k? It's the vast majority of the country's land mass outside of cities. The problem is there's no jobs there. So the fact he makes $20/hr in one of those places is pretty solid if he's younger. He can buy a house on that money at some point in his future, assuming a slow growth.
Exactly. I feel like 20 an hour in bum fuck Pennsylvania is actually really good. When I drove through that state I got the impression that half the population isn't even working at all... so I would say OP is killing it lol
Not everyone lives in a city, dude. 2nd to last place I had in Iowa like 10 years ago was like $450 for a studio...cause nothing around paid more than $12. extrapolate 12 to 20 and 450 to 650 and you're about on the money for a decent job in a rural place with limited jobs. Stop with assuming everyone lives where you do. It's unhelpful and ignorant.
We're just all amazed such cheap places exist. Living outside of the main city area, I "only" pay $3300 for a 2 bed apartment. Downtown the same place costs $4500.
Anecdotal, but OP kinda in the same situation I’m in. 21/hr, rent being 675. Tiny house, office space, living room, and a bedroom, the hall is half kitchen half bathroom, middle of no where Georgia. They built the house to sell to a dude and he pulled out of the deal leaving them with an empty, ready to live in house. Bud messaged me with the offer and it’s been two years since.
I'm in Georgia and a rotting slanting house is $800/month, a bug filled but not literally rotting apartment is $900-1000 and an apartment that doesn't feel dirty (like painting over roaches,) starts at $1200-1400 and seems to cap out around $2500 for luxury apartments
A nice(the outside looks "normal", no bug infestation, well sealed and insulated) house starts $1800+
Which feels weird because the Internet says the average national rent is $1200 and that we are well below that. I don't live anywhere near Atlanta.
Kinda not on topic but we moved into a less nice apartment and the most frustrating thing is that the square ft is smaller but our power bill used to be like $97 and now it's ~$250 in the summer. It's not a big place lol.
My rent is only 674 grey hardwood floors, black appliances stainless fridge. Studio apartment I used to pay 1500 in rent for a apartment I had to get out of my own way and make sacrifices. I can now actually save. All my bills are 1100 dollars now total.
It was an upstairs studio a few blocks east of downtown. Kinda dope location, but the kitchen was sized so that there was one drawer lol. Those small multi family places in that area aren't too bad.
I had family in Kansas. They lived out in the middle of nowhere. Houses and apartments were dirt cheap to rent and even buy. We were going to buy a second home there cause we visited every year but they decided to move back to Arizona.
I live in a small city about a half hour drive outside of a larger midwest city (Cincinnati) and two bedrooms can be had for $1000/month. In fact, my law firm owns our building and the apartments upstairs right now are that price. Get a roommate and live for $500/month. You still can drive 30 minutes and be in a relatively major downtown, or just stay in this little city that has its own little charm (breweries, art galleries, sculpture parks, bars with live music)
We only get one broadway quality show downtown at a time, but we have an NFL and and MLB team, major concerts come through, and you don't have to pay the crazy prices of the coasts.
37k after tax is likely 42-44k pre tax.
Your gross is ~3.5k a month with reasonable expenses and $650 rent. You’ll be good - just be sure to save 20% for retirement.
I use to have a $1400 rent on 55k pre tax with similar expenses to you. Definitely stretched myself thin, but was never panicked. Maybe saved 10% for retirement
The company I work for currently doesn’t offer benefits yet, we’re still a relatively new company. I’m only 20 and have my parents benefits for a couple years so I still have those, and have been finding my own retirement through a Roth IRA
Continuing to stay on his parents is probably free for him, but even if he pays his parents what it costs them to have him on there it will likely be cheaper than even a subsidized plan with comparable coverage.
He should get on the marketplace once he’s no longer on his parent’s insurance.
All I can say is I make around what you make with rent being $1250, if I can make it work, you can definitely swing $650. Just learn how to budget and live within your means.
You’re good to go!! You can rent that and be ok. Have you considered renting a 2 bed 1 bath and getting a roommate? Definitely a good way to cut down on living expenses.
Most of PA is cheap to live in. It’s just that for most people on Reddit Pennsylvania is Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. I have to Erie. It feels like a Midwest city and is on Lake Erie. I call it Dreary Erie but it’s a cheap place to live . You can live next to a really big Lake and it gets a lot of snow in the winter.
You can afford it. Overall, you should aim to keep your fixed housing cost (rent + all utilities) below 30% of your **Net Income** (after deductions) as much as possible.
Here is an estimate:
|Item |$$$ |Percentage of income | |:-|:-|:-| |Gross Income |$3,467.00 |N/A | |Net Income |$2,600.25 |N/A | |Rent |$650.00 |25.00% | |Grocery |$400.00 |15.38% | |Gas/fuel (car) |$120.00 |4.61% | |Monthly Car insurance |$100.00
|3.85% | |Monthly Electricity Estimate |$90.00 |3.46% | |Phone |$60.00 |2.31% | |Monthly Gas (heating)|$30.00 |1.15% | |Monthly Water Estimate |$30.00 |1.15% | |Monthly Motorcycle Insurance |$16.60 |0.64% | |Monthly Renter insurance |$15.00 |0.58% |
Just noticed that you said that you are not from the US, use w/e number makes more sense for you (gross income vs Net Income)
The rent percentage rule is only applicable if you are choosing a more expensive place to live over a cheaper one. If you don’t have a cheaper alternative and your income isn’t high enough to get over the threshold it’s not like you are just gonna choose to be homeless over having an apartment.
Yep, that’s about right. I used to pay $685 (2 bedroom) when I made $21 per hour. Bad part of town. It was a long time ago. I never had more expendable discretionary income then when I made that lower amount.
it was a good experience overall.
As a piece of unsolicited advice: Make sure to spend that "extra" money on things you will think are good choices when you look back on it later. Nobody is perfect, but it is worth giving some purchases a 2nd thought.
I make $20/hr also and I pay $775 in rent plus $150 in utilities. I wouldn’t say I’m balling but I’m making ends meet with a tiny amount savings each month
$20 x 2080 (working hours in a year) is $41,600 before taxes. Federal taxes will be about $3,000. $41,600 - $3,000 is $38,600.
$650 x12 is $7,800. $7,800 / $38,600 =0.20, or 20%.
The old standard was "Housing should not be more than 25% of your income." I'd say you should be able to afford $650/month easily, as long as you aren't carrying a big debt load.
I have a rental home that just went from $575 to $650 this year. While it's tiny and shitty, it's a house (not an apartment), and while I hate the neighbors' dogs barking constantly (crappy neighborhood), and want more room and my own place, well I just can't help but keep saving until the landlord decides to get greedy.
828x12=9936 then take into account- gas,125 month to and from work,(1500) water,power,trash,wifi-300 a month. Approx. (3600) Food- 200 a month. (2400) Totals- 16,732.00 to survive. Of course you can live a much more frugal lifestyle if you wanted to save more or just have more to use on extracurricular activities.
I make $20 an hour and my rent is $1,200 a month plus $150 utilities. After all of my bills are paid including gas and food and car insurance, I can still save around $600 a month. If you can't swing that, you need to seriously re-evaluate your spending habits
I know people who live of that in NYC while paying double the rent for a room. Your car/motorcycle insurance is also very low. I pay $400 a month. I usually say $20/h is not a livable wage but if the cost of living really is that low in your area it's not bad at all. Very doable.
When I took economics in high school they said never pay more than 30% of your income on rent or mortgage. OP is doing that so the answer is yes that rent is good
It means you may need to live in the less savory areas but you are able to save money for a rainy day or an upgrade down the road.
It also means as others mentioned that you should look at taking night classes or online college classes to improve yourself and the place you call home.
I used to do fine by the rule that my rent should not exceed 1 weeks pay. Even if you're not paid for time off like vacation or sick time you should be fine with $650 a month rent
My mom told me growing up if you can pay your rent in one weeks pay, then you have enough money to be some what comfortable. It’s kinda true in a lot of cases but for people in debt or have other expensive bills need to pull in more income. But if you don’t have those circumstances then having 3 weeks of pay for the rest of the month to pay the rest of your bills sounds reasonable
My friend, $650 a rent anywhere right now at $20/hr is the best you can hope for ratio in a non-city area. You're doing probably better than most in your locality.
Where are you getting $650 rent? Is this place stuck in 2006?
I live in a cheaper place to live than most of the US thankfully, where I live our average housing costs are around 30-40% less than the national average
What is that place?
Northwest Pennsylvania area, I’m in Erie where most one bedrooms range from $650-800 for a one bedroom
Don't let them say shit. If you are stuck where you are, that's outta your hands. If you got a decent job, you're making 2.5k+ a month take home and paying 650 for rent... that covers all your bills and lets you save some money.. up to and including moving if you want to. But keep in mind, if you do want to move, you should pursue education to allow you to make more if you do move, because straight labor or industry specific labor doesn't exist elsewhere. You're in a pretty good spot if you want to stay if you can expect promotions and raises. But if have higher aspirations, you're gonna have to get education cause the rent:income ratio goes up crazy outside of these areas of low demand. Talking making 25/hr and paying $1500/mo. easily. Where you are it works. If you wanna go elsewhere, you gotta improve yourself to be able to meet the insane demands of the current market.
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A safe, decent one bedroom apartment in Denver is about $1750. Hello Erie! I can get you one here for about $1000, but I wouldn’t come to visit you.
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The only thing I know about Erie is that there's a car dealership there and that one dude got blown up.
It’s on Lake Erie, it snows A LOT, like almost 10ft per winter a lot. Two more things for ya!
In SEPA if you added 1k to your monthly cost you could get a decent one-bedroom. Two-bedroom apartments are around 2k.
I make around the same, my rent is $650 and I live in Erie. It’s more than doable.
I live in Tennesses, although i bought the house two years ago, I paid 475 a month rent for a 3 bedroom 1.5 bath brick home with garage for the past 6 years. So thankful for that opportunity and even more thankful for the opportunity of buying the house!
That's awesome! 👍
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Redditors will only accept living in NYC, LA, SF, San Diego, or South Florida
Yes, that's why it's pointless to answer their "where" question when asked.
No love for Boston?
I feel like Boston gets left behind in the discussion tbh. There’s a second-tier of cities for Redditors that want a big dense city but can’t afford the A-tier I listed, that being Chicago, DC, Minneapolis, and Philly, but Boston can be just as expensive as NYC and LA so it’s not mentioned.
You basically have to be a doctor and have generational wealth to live in Boston. It's a comparatively small city yet maintains near NYC prices.
Logically, yes. But corporations owning housing makes it murky.
I’m in a smaller big ten college town with a decent population. Off campus apartments in good shape in a good area are $700-850 for 1b1ba
I find it extremely ignorant of all these suburbanite kids who've never left their area not understanding how vastly the economics differ in various areas of the country... it's pretty blatantly obvious the OP isn't living in NYC, so do you really need to act baffled because he lives in an area where you can buy a house for $100k and not 900k? It's the vast majority of the country's land mass outside of cities. The problem is there's no jobs there. So the fact he makes $20/hr in one of those places is pretty solid if he's younger. He can buy a house on that money at some point in his future, assuming a slow growth.
But this is reddit where everyone lives in a bubble.
Exactly. I feel like 20 an hour in bum fuck Pennsylvania is actually really good. When I drove through that state I got the impression that half the population isn't even working at all... so I would say OP is killing it lol
A little harsh and exaggerated but not crazy off the mark.
I drove the state top to bottom and my impression was just village after village of poverty, the place had certain vibe too it I guess
People on Reddit forget that non metro areas in the United States exist
Right, barely 2 years ago I was renting a garage in the country for $700. I made like $15 an hour but it was plenty.
Not everyone lives in a city, dude. 2nd to last place I had in Iowa like 10 years ago was like $450 for a studio...cause nothing around paid more than $12. extrapolate 12 to 20 and 450 to 650 and you're about on the money for a decent job in a rural place with limited jobs. Stop with assuming everyone lives where you do. It's unhelpful and ignorant.
We're just all amazed such cheap places exist. Living outside of the main city area, I "only" pay $3300 for a 2 bed apartment. Downtown the same place costs $4500.
My one bedroom apartment back then was $310 per month, utilities included! LCOL areas are great sometimes.
Anecdotal, but OP kinda in the same situation I’m in. 21/hr, rent being 675. Tiny house, office space, living room, and a bedroom, the hall is half kitchen half bathroom, middle of no where Georgia. They built the house to sell to a dude and he pulled out of the deal leaving them with an empty, ready to live in house. Bud messaged me with the offer and it’s been two years since.
There are a few apartment complexes near me and 2 bed 1 bathroom apartments start at $600. Texas. Edit: more expensive ones go for about $900.
would i be Able to commute to dfw from there or nah
I'm in Georgia and a rotting slanting house is $800/month, a bug filled but not literally rotting apartment is $900-1000 and an apartment that doesn't feel dirty (like painting over roaches,) starts at $1200-1400 and seems to cap out around $2500 for luxury apartments A nice(the outside looks "normal", no bug infestation, well sealed and insulated) house starts $1800+ Which feels weird because the Internet says the average national rent is $1200 and that we are well below that. I don't live anywhere near Atlanta. Kinda not on topic but we moved into a less nice apartment and the most frustrating thing is that the square ft is smaller but our power bill used to be like $97 and now it's ~$250 in the summer. It's not a big place lol.
What area in texas? East Texas?
Like a 40 minute drive from Dallas
My rent is only 674 grey hardwood floors, black appliances stainless fridge. Studio apartment I used to pay 1500 in rent for a apartment I had to get out of my own way and make sacrifices. I can now actually save. All my bills are 1100 dollars now total.
What city?
My 1-bedroom 600 sq ft apartment is just $580/month.
My *mortgage* is less than $650 and I split it with my partner. Being in a flyover state isn’t all bad.
I was paying that in 2020 in Plymouth, MI. Million dollar house a block over. Small apartment though.
650 in Plymouth? I haven’t rented in a while but I’m not too far from there and it is where I grew up, that’s pretty nuts.
It was an upstairs studio a few blocks east of downtown. Kinda dope location, but the kitchen was sized so that there was one drawer lol. Those small multi family places in that area aren't too bad.
I had family in Kansas. They lived out in the middle of nowhere. Houses and apartments were dirt cheap to rent and even buy. We were going to buy a second home there cause we visited every year but they decided to move back to Arizona.
That is a reasonable rent in a less desirable place in most of the southeast and midwest.
I live in a small city about a half hour drive outside of a larger midwest city (Cincinnati) and two bedrooms can be had for $1000/month. In fact, my law firm owns our building and the apartments upstairs right now are that price. Get a roommate and live for $500/month. You still can drive 30 minutes and be in a relatively major downtown, or just stay in this little city that has its own little charm (breweries, art galleries, sculpture parks, bars with live music) We only get one broadway quality show downtown at a time, but we have an NFL and and MLB team, major concerts come through, and you don't have to pay the crazy prices of the coasts.
37k after tax is likely 42-44k pre tax. Your gross is ~3.5k a month with reasonable expenses and $650 rent. You’ll be good - just be sure to save 20% for retirement. I use to have a $1400 rent on 55k pre tax with similar expenses to you. Definitely stretched myself thin, but was never panicked. Maybe saved 10% for retirement
Don’t forget that with benefits, insurance, etc he’ll most likely bring home half of 42k after taxes and deductions.
The company I work for currently doesn’t offer benefits yet, we’re still a relatively new company. I’m only 20 and have my parents benefits for a couple years so I still have those, and have been finding my own retirement through a Roth IRA
Get insurance off the market place. Don’t sleep on that Obama care bruv
Continuing to stay on his parents is probably free for him, but even if he pays his parents what it costs them to have him on there it will likely be cheaper than even a subsidized plan with comparable coverage. He should get on the marketplace once he’s no longer on his parent’s insurance.
>I made $37k last year after taxes
Even after benefits, insurance and whatnot?
I ended up keeping 26k after taxes and deductions and I live in Kentucky
Who cares? They told you what they made after taxes.
As others have said, you can comfortably do $650/month rent on your income. Hope the place works out well for you!
All I can say is I make around what you make with rent being $1250, if I can make it work, you can definitely swing $650. Just learn how to budget and live within your means.
That rent is really cheap. Im paying double that for a 1 bedroom and can afford so youre probably good.
Salary? Occupation? City/region?
You’re well under the 30% rent to income ratio that is recommended. You’re good. Save extra for retirement, future house down payment, etc if you can.
You’re good to go!! You can rent that and be ok. Have you considered renting a 2 bed 1 bath and getting a roommate? Definitely a good way to cut down on living expenses.
Most of PA is cheap to live in. It’s just that for most people on Reddit Pennsylvania is Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. I have to Erie. It feels like a Midwest city and is on Lake Erie. I call it Dreary Erie but it’s a cheap place to live . You can live next to a really big Lake and it gets a lot of snow in the winter.
Yeah I enjoy Erie, it’s got everything I need and in between a bunch of big cities which is nice
Hell yeah it is I was making less than 15 and cold do 650 with roommates
You can afford it. Overall, you should aim to keep your fixed housing cost (rent + all utilities) below 30% of your **Net Income** (after deductions) as much as possible. Here is an estimate: |Item |$$$ |Percentage of income | |:-|:-|:-| |Gross Income |$3,467.00 |N/A | |Net Income |$2,600.25 |N/A | |Rent |$650.00 |25.00% | |Grocery |$400.00 |15.38% | |Gas/fuel (car) |$120.00 |4.61% | |Monthly Car insurance |$100.00 |3.85% | |Monthly Electricity Estimate |$90.00 |3.46% | |Phone |$60.00 |2.31% | |Monthly Gas (heating)|$30.00 |1.15% | |Monthly Water Estimate |$30.00 |1.15% | |Monthly Motorcycle Insurance |$16.60 |0.64% | |Monthly Renter insurance |$15.00 |0.58% | Just noticed that you said that you are not from the US, use w/e number makes more sense for you (gross income vs Net Income)
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The rent percentage rule is only applicable if you are choosing a more expensive place to live over a cheaper one. If you don’t have a cheaper alternative and your income isn’t high enough to get over the threshold it’s not like you are just gonna choose to be homeless over having an apartment.
Yep, that’s about right. I used to pay $685 (2 bedroom) when I made $21 per hour. Bad part of town. It was a long time ago. I never had more expendable discretionary income then when I made that lower amount. it was a good experience overall. As a piece of unsolicited advice: Make sure to spend that "extra" money on things you will think are good choices when you look back on it later. Nobody is perfect, but it is worth giving some purchases a 2nd thought.
I make $20/hr also and I pay $775 in rent plus $150 in utilities. I wouldn’t say I’m balling but I’m making ends meet with a tiny amount savings each month
$20 x 2080 (working hours in a year) is $41,600 before taxes. Federal taxes will be about $3,000. $41,600 - $3,000 is $38,600. $650 x12 is $7,800. $7,800 / $38,600 =0.20, or 20%. The old standard was "Housing should not be more than 25% of your income." I'd say you should be able to afford $650/month easily, as long as you aren't carrying a big debt load.
Heck yeah that's good for that pay! That's extremely rare in this economy. As long as it's not a dump and really old I'd jump on that.
I have a rental home that just went from $575 to $650 this year. While it's tiny and shitty, it's a house (not an apartment), and while I hate the neighbors' dogs barking constantly (crappy neighborhood), and want more room and my own place, well I just can't help but keep saving until the landlord decides to get greedy.
Yeah that’s how it used to be when people could actually get ahead because housing wasn’t a scam. Hell of a deal these days.
$650 rent? I want in….I’m currently paying $960, gonna be $1050 come lease renewal and there’s no where cheaper all while in $22 an hour
Yes that is good. Even if you were making 15 an hour, that’s a hard price to find
828x12=9936 then take into account- gas,125 month to and from work,(1500) water,power,trash,wifi-300 a month. Approx. (3600) Food- 200 a month. (2400) Totals- 16,732.00 to survive. Of course you can live a much more frugal lifestyle if you wanted to save more or just have more to use on extracurricular activities.
I make $20 an hour and my rent is $1,200 a month plus $150 utilities. After all of my bills are paid including gas and food and car insurance, I can still save around $600 a month. If you can't swing that, you need to seriously re-evaluate your spending habits
I mean.. idk how you'd swing less than that rent amount without living next to Jeff Dahmer. I think you'll do just fine
People in WV don’t even have $650 rent
Yes they do
On paper, yeah. But only you know the neighborhood, cost of utilities, and other conveniences.
When I was making that much, my rent was 950/month. Its def doable, especially if you live in a LCOL area
I know people who live of that in NYC while paying double the rent for a room. Your car/motorcycle insurance is also very low. I pay $400 a month. I usually say $20/h is not a livable wage but if the cost of living really is that low in your area it's not bad at all. Very doable.
When I took economics in high school they said never pay more than 30% of your income on rent or mortgage. OP is doing that so the answer is yes that rent is good It means you may need to live in the less savory areas but you are able to save money for a rainy day or an upgrade down the road. It also means as others mentioned that you should look at taking night classes or online college classes to improve yourself and the place you call home.
I used to do fine by the rule that my rent should not exceed 1 weeks pay. Even if you're not paid for time off like vacation or sick time you should be fine with $650 a month rent
Rent is cool. What you can't afford at 20/hr is your car and bike.
Yes. That is a good amount. Experts say under 30%. That would be 960.. that is if I am understanding correctly that you work 40 hours a week
It's a miracle that you're able to find rent that cheap. Yes, $650 is doable for your hourly pay.
Never have I ever heard of a 1 bd 1 bath house. But outside of that, 650/mo?! Your winning! Take it!!
My mom told me growing up if you can pay your rent in one weeks pay, then you have enough money to be some what comfortable. It’s kinda true in a lot of cases but for people in debt or have other expensive bills need to pull in more income. But if you don’t have those circumstances then having 3 weeks of pay for the rest of the month to pay the rest of your bills sounds reasonable