Utilities, taxes expenditures (health insurance, how much, house)

[SouthBound58]

Can someone give me monthly averages variables $ wise just so I have an idea to budget. I am sure county wise there is a difference but say Warren or Barren county and right now I am leaning more toward Barren county. After we move hubby will be retired so we will be on a smaller fixed income than now.
In IL monthly:
Electric & natural gas for heat, AC, washer, dryer etc. $250-$300 some months in winter gas can be as much as $250-$380

Water, sewer and garbage pickup $80

Phone/DSL combined $100

Satellite $59 medium plan

Health Insurance $200

$450 for food

Yearly
Car license/tags $78 each for truck and SUV
$58 Travel Trailer

Auto Insurance $ 1200 for both autos
$300 for Travel trailer

Home insurance $ 883 no flood insurance and we are more than 500 ft from water hydrant.

Property taxes $4200 ( With Homestead exemption $ 4800 without Homestead exemption)

Home is 1700 sq ft., 42 years old but we do have thermopane windows and extra attic insulation.

Also we have State income tax
Sales tax 8.5 %
Diesel fuel $3.59 gal unleaded $3.14 gal.

Unfortunately I also smoke so carton cigarettes in Cook county $59 carton but I usually hop over into IN and only pay $44 a carton but we save a lot a lot on eating out as all restaurants are smoke free so we always eat at home.

How will these amounts compare with say Barren county averages? Hopefully property taxes will be much much less. Now we have to budget $ 475 a month just for property taxes and insurance.

Would someone tell me how much they pay to live in KY for these same bills just so I can get a general idea how the different areas compare.

Thank you in advance.

[Davart]

There really is no way to effectively answer this question.

How much utilities you use varies greatly, the cost from company to company and local taxes varies greatly. Are you in the city or county? County is generally less. Gas is it natural or propane and how much do you use, how well insulated is the house. Where I live TV/Internet/Phone is $200/mo on one bill, but that's the package I have, some are cheaper.
Auto - what's your driving record, age, age of cars, etc etc.

See there are way to many variables to even give you a guess.

However ..
Sale Tax 6%
Cigarette depend on brand, $20-$30+ carton.
Property tax varies all over and depends on the value of the property.

I can assure you nearly all of KY is cheaper than Cook Co (Chicago), perhaps all of it.

[SouthBound58]

Originally Posted by Davart

There really is no way to effectively answer this question.

How much utilities you use varies greatly, the cost from company to company and local taxes varies greatly. Are you in the city or county? County is generally less. Gas is it natural or propane and how much do you use, how well insulated is the house. Where I live TV/Internet/Phone is $200/mo on one bill, but that's the package I have, some are cheaper.
Auto - what's your driving record, age, age of cars, etc etc.

See there are way to many variables to even give you a guess.

However ..
Sale Tax 6%
Cigarette depend on brand, $20-$30+ carton.
Property tax varies all over and depends on the value of the property.

I can assure you nearly all of KY is cheaper than Cook Co (Chicago), perhaps all of it.

I have been looking at homes in county not city and definitely not a subdivision. I would want city water not well water. We prefer all electric heat not natural gas as we have here, and definitely not propane, too expensive.

The house we have here in IL is probably $300,000 not sure as we have been in this house 15 years and haven't had a recent estimate. I have been looking at homes with 5 to 10 acres under $239,000 but just started looking this week so haven't found that many Online that actually have the requirements we think we need but prefer small mini farm. Want country setting but not isolated rural. We have also been in a large metropolitan are too many years to go to rural and isolated and want to be closer to a larger city. We were hoping property taxes would be less than $800.
We aren't stuck on these two counties just picked them because of being close to I65. We hope to also travel some, go rving, fishing whatever strikes us. But we are leaving adult children and grandchildren behind in IL so being close to I65 seems logical for traveling. We are not sure how long we can go at one time without seeing the grand babies.

We have had the same auto insurance company( State Farm) for over 40 years we just stayed with them all these years, and both have good driving records. Home insurance is also State Farm.

The truck is a 2000 F350 Dually 7.3 LA West Conversion and the SUV is a 2002 Eddie Bauer Expedition. Not sure about auto insurance being less. But just cutting the property taxes from $4200 to say $800 would be great.

Travel Trailer insurance is with progressive and have checked that on rv.net and it won't be less because of moving except as the trailer gets older the premium decreases.

I guess I still have plenty of time to check costs but will need to check out the different providers in different areas.

Here in Cook county there is only one provider for electric, natural gas and phone service so they have a monopoly on that.
Wow I guess I wrote too much so will shut up for now and go back to researching. Thanks for the reply.

[Davart]

and definitely not propane, too expensive

Propane is cheaper than natural gas and often cheaper than electric.

In the county if you often have septic, so no sewer cost.

We were hoping property taxes would be less than $800

Better buy a house under $100K then.

Taxes average around $900 per $100K but it varies from county to county and varies even within the county.

The truck is a 2000 F350 Dually 7.3 LA West Conversion and the SUV is a 2002 Eddie Bauer Expedition.

Gas is about $2.90+/- right now ... might want to find something smaller.

Home insurance is also State Farm.

Farm Bureau is cheaper on average even if you've never had them before on auto/home/rider insurance.

But we are leaving adult children and grandchildren behind in IL so being close to I65 seems logical for traveling.

I'm in Western KY, which is historically cheaper than most of the state, and I24 runs through it which hooks up with I57 in southern IL, which goes right into Chicago. Getting to Chicago from KY is not all that hard from nearly any part of the state. But if you go RV'ing why take the interstate, they're boring. I travel back roads.