Affordable Living - Entire State Expensive? (Burlington, Essex Junction: sales, real estate, 2014)

[FIJI67]

Hi all-

I've been lurking here for a while, browsing the forums and whatnot. Forgive me if this subject has been covered - I searched around a bit but didn't quite find the answer I was looking for.

I have a career move opportunity to work in Burlington VT. My only holdback is the (from what I can tell) crazy high cost of living. I'm relatively young and currently reside in the Midwest. Prior to this job, I traveled the country (and world) so I'm familiar with many different areas - but VT was never somewhere I ended up for any amount of time.

The Burlington area seems to be an expensive area to live - apartment rent sores into the 2000 range fast and a single family home seems to be well above the national average for price per square foot and property.

However - there are also many desirable aspects to Burlington that I've noticed.

My main question is - are there other suburbs or metro areas of Burlington that are more affordable and do not sacrifice the quality of structure and life (no major increase in crime, etc)? Ideally - I'd be looking for a single family home around the 200k price point - built in the last 30 years. Just curious if anyone has any compelling reasons before I make a decision!

[leadingedge04]

Vermont is very expensive.

[timberline742]

Having lived in the Midwest, I can tell you a place like Madison WI, which is culturally similar to Burlington VT (where I've also lived) is far less expensive than Burlington without a big difference in wages.

Burlington is just expensive, no way to get around that. I've tried to move back a few times from both the Midwest and Boston area and the salaries vs cost of living ratio just has made it impossible.

[harry chickpea]

"My main question is - are there other suburbs or metro areas of Burlington that are more affordable and do not sacrifice the quality of structure and life (no major increase in crime, etc)? Ideally - I'd be looking for a single family home around the 200k price point - built in the last 30 years. Just curious if anyone has any compelling reasons before I make a decision!"

Skip the idea of a house for at least a year, to see if the area works for you in general. Just slice anything south of the old K-Mart shopping center off your list for "affordable." Likewise for anything on the hill. If you can find a rent in Ft. Ethan Allen or Lakeside, those can be convenient and fairly quiet. Both are older buildings though.

To live in Vermont, you have to compromise unless you have more money than sense.

[GeoffD]

By left coast/right coast standards, Vermont is not a wildly high cost of living area. Nationally, it's exactly average because housing prices are quite moderate. Here is the Department of Commerce data on it and a state-by-state comparison graphic:

BEA: News Release: Real Personal Income for States and Metropolitan Areas, 2014


Burlington has expensive rental housing stock by Vermont standards because you're competing with all the college students for a limited number of units. Energy costs are high. The overall tax burden is fairly high. It all looks dirt cheap when you compare it to a true high cost area like the Bay Area, Southern California, Seattle, NYC tri-state, metro-DC, or metro-Boston.

[timberline742]

Originally Posted by GeoffD

Burlington has expensive rental housing stock by Vermont standards because you're competing with all the college students for a limited number of units. Energy costs are high. The overall tax burden is fairly high. It all looks dirt cheap when you compare it to a true high cost area like the Bay Area, Southern California, Seattle, NYC tri-state, metro-DC, or metro-Boston.

Cost of living is only helpful when comparing it to salaries. This is where VT has it hard. Rents/real estate are fairly high, and wages very low.

[ravindrakaushik]

Cost of living is only helpful when comparing it to salaries.

[joe moving]

200k - depends on the requirements of the home but i'm sure you can find something for 200k within 45 min drive of burlington. under 30 years old - maybe, maybe not.

[GeoffD]

Originally Posted by timberline742

Cost of living is only helpful when comparing it to salaries. This is where VT has it hard. Rents/real estate are fairly high, and wages very low.

A prof at UVM or a nurse at Mary Fletcher or the engineer at the GlobalFoundries plant in Essex Junction make pretty much the same as anywhere. The Vermont median household income is a bit more than the national average. What are you comparing it to? New York City and Boston where a single family home in a non-failing school system suburban town is $750K?

If you don't have 21st century job skills and you're working a service sector job, the pay is lousy anywhere. It pays more in the high cost of living regions but it gets eaten up by rents that blow away anything Vermont sees. Chittenden County rental housing is expensive because affluent out-of-state college students can out-pay local service sector people for the rental housing stock. That is certainly not true anywhere else in the state other than the resort towns which also have out-of-state money that can out-pay what the locals can afford. Vermont is average in pretty much everything except for the very progressive tax burden. If you're at the median, you escape the high state income tax brackets and the nasty Act 68 state school property tax is means tested so your tax burden is average by regional standards (but not New Hampshire, of course). If you're a physician or a tenured prof at UVM or an engineer at GlobalFoundries, you're getting crushed in all directions on your taxes. You're paying 100% of that Act 68 school tax on your house. You're in a high state income tax bracket. Plus you're paying the hefty sales tax and high energy costs everyone in Vermont pays.

So regionally, Vermont is a lower cost state with a bit lower median income. Nationally, it's pretty much average. The people here are making the mistake of comparing income to massively high cost of living places but not considering what the housing costs look like in those places.

[MsNancy]

As a rule, Chittenden County costs way more to live in than the rest of the state.