Help! Can we afford to move to Boston? (New Bedford, Quincy: apartments, renters)

[JaffaCake]

Hi All!

A complete newbie to this forum but from browsing through I have found so much useful information. Now I am going to pluck up the courage and post my own questions! :-)

We may have the possiblity to move to Boston however we need to check our finances whether we would be able to afford this. Here is a list of my questions. MANY THANKS in advance for all your help!

- We would be looking for a 3BD house/apartment in a safe area (we have one kid!) with "easy" communting (either car or public transport) to Kendall Square. Which areas would be best to consider? So far I have been looking at Watertown, Medford, Belmont, Arlington & Newton. Do any other good areas spring to mind?

- Would a rent from $2000-$2500 be a realistic price? We are not looking for anything fancy nor big just practical and near to public transport :-)

- How much could we approximately expect to pay for utilities over and above the price of the rent?

- How much could we approximately expect to pay for other daily costs of living such as transportation, food etc. I know this is pretty hard to define but would say $1000 per month cover food, transportation and leisure? We are not great restaurant eaters nor party goers as our kid is still young!;-)

- Any special costs that we may have to cover that only Bostonians know about?!

I fear I may bombard you all with more questions as they come up and I am sorry if you are repeating yourselves but your help is HUGELY appreciated!

[timberline742]

I think you could do this for 2250-2500 in Arlington (77 to Porter, transfer to Red Line) or 2000-2500 in Quincy (straight red line); I think you're priced out of Davis Sq/Porter Sq, which would be preferable. I would pick Arlington, a bit longer commute because of the bus, but I like the vibe better, definitely safe, good schools, just nice. Mind you, I'm only thinking of public transit commutes to Kendall; I would not want to drive there daily unless I had no other choice.

The 1000 might be an issue. I eat well on $40 a week, but that is me. Lots of people drop their jaw at that (I don't know what they do), but plenty of people will think 3 people with a growing kid should be looking at a $200/wk grocery bill. If that is the case, you'll be hard pressed to do any leisure at all at 1000/month.

[Dm84]

You didn't say how young your kid is but daycare can run over $25,000/year in Metro Boston.

As far as utilities go, you need to be careful if the apartments you're looking at have oil heat that the tenant pays for.

Driving to Kendall Square is not something you want to do every day.

Where are you moving from?

[kingeorge]

That is tight budget with food costs and other expenses including heat which is often not included in the rent. You would probably be better off not trying to spend more than $1800-2K a month and you will not find 3bd on that budget. You will have excise tax on car. Insurance is not cheap as well. Then renters insurance (optional but advisable). You will have activities in school/preschool you will be paying for. Child care is super expensive. You need good winter clothes. Phone and internet are overpriced as well. Then you need to spend money on public transportation and parking. Electricity, gas (if present in your building). Things add up quickly.
Look online, MBTA has very good site with all costs listed. Also check costs of living comparisons and calculators to understand how much you need to make to sustain same quality of living...

Good luck.

[xo_kizzy_xo]

We have friends (two adults, one dog, no kids) who just moved up here. They're staying with us at the moment. They're having more sticker shock than they expected in all areas -- groceries, for example, are much more expensive here than they were back where they lived. Ditto rents. I've been telling them minimum $2000 for a decent 2BR place in the general metro Boston area, if not more, less the further out they move. They have friends who recently bought a house down in the New Bedford area for a song...their eyes lit up and I was like, "Do you REALLY want to do that commute in the dead of winter?"

We've been splitting groceries, and it's probably evening out to roughly $200-250/week. But keep in mind that's 4 adults, not 2 adults and a child, and 2 of the adults are hearty eaters.

They're paying us nominal rent because of their circumstances, but I'm also asking for 1/3 utilities. Heating -- especially oil -- is expensive. I nearly keeled over when I discovered what my budget payment is for this winter Electricity is going up this winter too -- earlier if you're attached to National Grid, according to the news. We have a basic cable bundle and that's gone up too. We also have one of the higher water rates in the Boston area. It all adds up.

(it's probably a good thing I'm not throwing property tax into the mix or they'll run screaming for the Canadian border)

They have no budget for leisure anything, btw. As a group, our leisure time = cooking, watching TV, being on the computer, the occasional bottle of wine, and taking care of the dogs (we have one too). I suppose we could budget something for leisure, but it'd be robbing Peter to pay Paul, so to speak.

[SoFresh99]

Look at the MBTA website to get a sense of what public transportation will cost a month, you do not want to drive to Kendall. Stick close to the redline, the cheapest/safest you are going to get is Quincy.

Be prepared to settle for a 2br, and mind windows/doors when you shop for your apartment because you could rent something 100 years old with no storm windows and end up paying $600/mo just for heat. OTOH you could find something 100yo that has been upgraded and only pay $150/mo for heat. Electricty would be $75 easy as it is slated to go up 35%. Avoid places heated with oil.

Having a child will make finding an apartment difficult as Massachusetts has declared that it is encumbent upon all landlords to de-lead the dwelling if the tenant has a child. Although it is technically illegal this ends up causing massive discrimination against people with kids. It will be hard to get a call back on an apartment if you tell them upfront you have a kid.

Whatever you pay for car insurance be prepared for it to triple. When we left Boston we paid $2700/year for car insurance (2cars) that in Ohio costs us $700/year.

Food in Boston cost double for fresh food, same for processed food and ethnic restaurants are cheaper in Boston. You can extend your food budget by shopping for produce at bodegas and ethnic groceries but then you still have to go to the regular grocery for misc.

So budget $2000/rent, $500 utilities (inet $60, gas $250, elec $100 cell), $80 car ins(1car), $75 subway, $200/mo for work lunches unless he packs daily, $500/mo groceries (this is lowball.), $250/yr renters insurance. Add in your cellphones and car payments if you have any.

[timberline742]

Originally Posted by SoFresh99

Food in Boston cost double for fresh food, same for processed food and ethnic restaurants are cheaper in Boston. You can extend your food budget by shopping for produce at bodegas and ethnic groceries but then you still have to go to the regular grocery for misc.

This fascinates me, since I find groceries here to be less than when I lived in Wisconsin, and far far less than in California (though the quality of produce at the latter was far higher). It's amazing how these things vary.

[kingeorge]

Originally Posted by timberline742

This fascinates me, since I find groceries here to be less than when I lived in Wisconsin, and far far less than in California (though the quality of produce at the latter was far higher). It's amazing how these things vary.

Where do you shop? This is high cost area and food is expensive as well. I am not sure what exactly you eat that is so cheap? For a family of 3-5 you can not eat anything decent for less than $200 week and in most cases it is actually $300 or more, because if you have kids in school, food for healthy snack, drink, and lunches adds up quickly. No easy out with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches since they are almost all but outlawed to protect many kids with severe allergies.

I have been around as well, and this area by far has the worst prices vs. quality ratio.

[xo_kizzy_xo]

Originally Posted by timberline742

This fascinates me, since I find groceries here to be less than when I lived in Wisconsin, and far far less than in California (though the quality of produce at the latter was far higher). It's amazing how these things vary.

My SIL and her family lived in CA for a time. She still marvels at how less expensive/better quality the produce was there compared to here. OTOH she said that yes, groceries were more expensive there than here.

The produce thing makes sense since CA is considered our nation's fruit/veggie bowl. Whereas here the prices at farmers markets are much more expensive than elsewhere because of our short growing season.

[Dm84]

Originally Posted by kingeorge

Where do you shop? This is high cost area and food is expensive as well. I am not sure what exactly you eat that is so cheap? For a family of 3-5 you can not eat anything decent for less than $200 week and in most cases it is actually $300 or more, because if you have kids in school, food for healthy snack, drink, and lunches adds up quickly. No easy out with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches since they are almost all but outlawed to protect many kids with severe allergies.

I have been around as well, and this area by far has the worst prices vs. quality ratio.

This.

I grew up in an outer borough of NYC and the groceries were and still are significantly cheaper than they are in Boston and the suburbs.

Market Basket is the only grocery store that comes close to being reasonable but they aren't everywhere and it may not make sense to drive an extra few miles to shop there.