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To live “comfortably” as a single person in 99 of the largest U.S. metro areas, you’ll need a median income of $93,933, according to a recent SmartAsset analysis.
“Comfortable” is defined as the income needed to cover a 50/30/20 budget, which assumes 50% of your monthly income can pay for necessities like housing and utility costs, 30% can cover discretionary spending and 20% can be set aside for savings or investments.
SmartAsset extrapolated the income needed for a 50/30/20 budget based on the cost of necessities, using data from the MIT Living Wage Calculator.
Here’s the income a single person needs to live comfortably in the 25 U.S. cities with the highest cost of living:
- New York City: $138,570
- San Jose, California: $136,739
- Irvine, California: $126,797
- Santa Ana, California: $126,797
- Boston: $124,966
- San Diego: $122,803
- Chula Vista, California: $122,803
- San Francisco: $119,558
- Seattle: $119,392
- Oakland, California: $118,768
- Arlington, Virginia: $117,686
- Newark, New Jersey: $116,646
- Jersey, New Jersey: $116,646
- Long Beach, California: $114,691
- Anaheim, California: $114,691
- Honolulu: $111,904
- Los Angeles: $110,781
- Aurora, Colorado: $110,115
- Portland, Oregon: $110,032
- Riverside, California: $109,408
- Atlanta: $107,453
- Sacramento, California: $104,790
- Raleigh, North Carolina: $102,752
- Gilbert, Arizona: $102,752
- Glendale, Arizona: $102,752
New York City ranks first overall, requiring an income of $138,570 for a single person to live comfortably. In contrast, single people in Houston need to earn $75,088 — the lowest amount of all major U.S. cities examined.
Other large coastal cities follow NYC in the rankings. In Los Angeles, Honolulu, San Francisco, Seattle and Boston, you’d need to earn $110,000 or more to live comfortably as a single person. All of these cities command some of the highest living costs in the country, particularly for housing, according to The Council for Community and Economic Research.
Californians, in particular, have suffered from a longstanding housing shortage that’s worse than the U.S. overall, so it’s not surprising that 11 cities from the state are among the most expensive places to live, thus requiring higher salaries to live comfortably.
While employers in large, high-cost cities tend to offer higher-than-average salaries as a way to attract and retain talent, housing costs can make it difficult to maintain a 50/30/20 budget.
In New York City, a third of residents spend half of their income on rent, according to the Community Service Society. To compensate for high housing costs, residents commonly find room elsewhere in their budgets, whether that’s skipping out on homeownership or spending less on discretionary purchases.
Either way, those who live alone pay a significant “singles tax” in large cities when it comes to the costs of food, shelter and transportation.
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