Cost of Living Comparisons

[gutrageous]

Hello all,

There's a good chance that I might be offered an opportunity, i.e. asked without having much choice (ha), to move with my company to a higher COLA for what is initially a lateral move but with the opportunity for more advancement. Is there a good tool or resource out there to quantify the difference of COL between areas? I've googled it and get a bunch of hits but most are ads. The cities are in the same state so there are no state tax differences to contend with.

Thanks,
Gutrageous

[Jack FFR1846]

I find it more accurate to list what I want to compare and then go find it in the new location. Say your home with square footage and lot size and go look on Zillow and other sites to see what there is and what it costs. I found early in my career that head hunters don't do that. I had one looking to relocate in southern California. We had recently bought our house here outside of Boston, so I rattled specs off to the head hunter. 2800 square foot house on 14 acres for about $225k. She gave up as she could at the time find a $225k house but it would be a 600 square foot house on a postage stamp lot in Carlsbad.

[sport]

I find it more accurate to list what I want to compare and then go find it in the new location. Say your home with square footage and lot size and go look on Zillow and other sites to see what there is and what it costs. I found early in my career that head hunters don't do that. I had one looking to relocate in southern California. We had recently bought our house here outside of Boston, so I rattled specs off to the head hunter. 2800 square foot house on 14 acres for about $225k. She gave up as she could at the time find a $225k house but it would be a 600 square foot house on a postage stamp lot in Carlsbad.

That sounds like a good idea. However, it would not work well in my area. The prices for real estate are so variable depending on neighborhood or community that the range would be so wide as to be of little value. We have demand areas that have more elevated prices and conversely, there are less desirable areas that are much cheaper. The suggested method may work better in other locations.

[gatorking]

The variation usually comes from ranking of the school district. So you can add equivalent school district based on standardized scores, or some other ranking method.

[Barsoom]

You can try www.city-data.com.

Navigate to the city and then search for the string "cost of living index". Then compare it to another city.

Note that the data is from 2019, so it's three years old now. I suppose you can assume that the ratios would remain close considering growth in the last three years.

-B

[quietseas]

Agree, cost of housing and commute time/expense. I'd compare what you own now vs what you'd want in the new location. Living on 20 acres is not the same lifestyle as 8,000 square feet in a city. You have to adjust for the lifestyle change to make this a reasonable attempt to calculate the cost impact.

Your call whether COLA type data is useful or not.

By in-state not sure if you mean something like moving from Cupertino to Red Bluff or Lynchburg to Arlington (VA) or more similar like Houston to Dallas or Dayton to Cleveland where costs are a little more similar. Cost of groceries, vacation air travel, property tax, etc. might vary in some locations but not others.

Also I don't know if this calculation would help negotiate salary change with your employer or not. Many large employers will already have a formula they use for cost of living adjustments in various areas, you can ask but the package they offer you likely depends on whether they really want you to move.

[runninginvestor]

Hello all,

There's a good chance that I might be offered an opportunity, i.e. asked without having much choice (ha), to move with my company to a higher COLA for what is initially a lateral move but with the opportunity for more advancement. Is there a good tool or resource out there to quantify the difference of COL between areas? I've googled it and get a bunch of hits but most are ads. The cities are in the same state so there are no state tax differences to contend with.

Thanks,
Gutrageous

You could use the fed gov't locality pay tables to see what the difference is, as a baseline at least.
https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversig ... l-schedule
https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversig ... saltbl.pdf

Probably have to calculate the rate difference or just find a close salary to your current one/cur location and see what the fed equiv is at the new locale.

Dit: this is an interactive map: https://www.federalpay.org/gs/2022

[yog]

Salary.com -- Cost of Living Calculator

[Link reformatted by moderator oldcomputerguy]