Moving to Framingham/Natick area

[learn24]

Originally Posted by timberline742

Your costs will be closer to 50% higher, no doubt. I lived in Wisconsin and Madison and Milwaukee are super cheap for the quality of life. You'll also won't see cheese curds often, or bags of milk, or any New Glarus. I wouldn't do it for less than a third increase.

Ummn...if the costs are 50% higher, so a 100k in MKE would be 150k in Natick? I just don't have enough datapoints if the employees in Natick region get paid to that range....the salaries in glassdoor, payscale etc are very generic.

[mmyk72]

I'm not HR but what I understand is ... companies will have a salary range for each job/each level. You may not get X% increase for COL just because it's damn expensive here in MA, but you are hoping that the salary range is higher at this new company. You should have a pretty good idea what ballpark the salary you will be offered is - some people say don't bring that up initially but at some point they have to tell you. You can probably nudge that offer by a few %, but the company isn't typically going to move up the salary significantly because they have to stick to that internal salary scale. It doesn't matter that you want 50% more than the offer just because you need that to 'maintain your lifestyle'.

Typically when considering a new job, you should be aiming for X% increase - that could be 30/50/100%/etc... depending on the hassle factor of moving, new location COL, what you are bringing to the table and how badly the new company wants you, etc.... all in combination.

Just because a really nice 4 bed/3 bath house in a good school district is $500K in XYZ town, but the same quality /size / location becomes $1.5 Million at the new location, doesn't mean you get paid 3x more. Don't we all wish that's the case.

[SalamanderSmile]

Also be aware that Boston area companies often specifically recruit out of state when they cannot offer salaries high enough to entice people who are already here. So we see alot of posts from out of state-ers making a huge expensive move for what look like 35% wage increase s, but they come to find out that it only seems like an increase on paper due to higher rent, car ins. daycare, etc. Add in the merciless commuting and your QUALITY of life goes way down even if your salary doubles.

[timberline742]

Originally Posted by learn24

Ummn...if the costs are 50% higher, so a 100k in MKE would be 150k in Natick? I just don't have enough datapoints if the employees in Natick region get paid to that range....the salaries in glassdoor, payscale etc are very generic.

I'm not sure what your point is.

[CaseyB]

Originally Posted by SalamanderSmile

Also be aware that Boston area companies often specifically recruit out of state when they cannot offer salaries high enough to entice people who are already here. So we see alot of posts from out of state-ers making a huge expensive move for what look like 35% wage increase s, but they come to find out that it only seems like an increase on paper due to higher rent, car ins. daycare, etc. Add in the merciless commuting and your QUALITY of life goes way down even if your salary doubles.

Bingo.

[chicagoliz]

I don't think it is quite that extreme -- if your salary doubled from 15K to 30K, yeah, your QOL might go down. But if your salary went from $200K to $400K, I think your QOL would increase.

The biggest cost factor here is real estate/housing. If you don't have kids who are daycare age, then that is not an expense. Heating costs can be more. But, there are plenty of costs that really aren't more here than there are in other parts of the country. It depends significantly on what services and needs you have. If you have three kids under 5 who need daycare, the COL increase might be prohibitive. But, if your rent goes from $900 to %1500, and you have no kids, and the heat is included, many other costs might not go up at all. So if your salary nets you more than an extra $600, you could still come out ahead.

[SalamanderSmile]

Originally Posted by chicagoliz

I don't think it is quite that extreme -- if your salary doubled from 15K to 30K, yeah, your QOL might go down. But if your salary went from $200K to $400K, I think your QOL would increase.

The biggest cost factor here is real estate/housing. If you don't have kids who are daycare age, then that is not an expense. Heating costs can be more. But, there are plenty of costs that really aren't more here than there are in other parts of the country. It depends significantly on what services and needs you have. If you have three kids under 5 who need daycare, the COL increase might be prohibitive. But, if your rent goes from $900 to %1500, and you have no kids, and the heat is included, many other costs might not go up at all. So if your salary nets you more than an extra $600, you could still come out ahead.

We are talking about the OP who is paying $950 in rent now and concerned about like-kind being $1800/mo here. I would imagine s/he falls well within the salary range for whom my statement is true. Nobody going from 2-400k/yr would be posing such questions. It is very specifically the "my job pays $65k in WI but would pay me $85k in Boston" workers that these companies are targeting. With jobs that should pay $125k but don't/can't. They max out their H1B allottment and go searching out of state.

[Nobodybody]

Originally Posted by chicagoliz

I don't think it is quite that extreme -- if your salary doubled from 15K to 30K, yeah, your QOL might go down. But if your salary went from $200K to $400K, I think your QOL would increase.

The biggest cost factor here is real estate/housing. If you don't have kids who are daycare age, then that is not an expense. Heating costs can be more. But, there are plenty of costs that really aren't more here than there are in other parts of the country. It depends significantly on what services and needs you have. If you have three kids under 5 who need daycare, the COL increase might be prohibitive. But, if your rent goes from $900 to %1500, and you have no kids, and the heat is included, many other costs might not go up at all. So if your salary nets you more than an extra $600, you could still come out ahead.

This is an important factor. We always want to talk percentages when discussing increased salaries in Boston area vs other areas, but at the end of the day, the average rent level, etc., is a fixed cost. So while a 100% increase from 15k to 30k gives you an extra 15, and a 50% increase on 100k gives you 50k etc, it is better to know a fixed dollar amount.


For example, if rents are 1,000 a month where you are, and you are finding 1,500 a month in this area, that is a 500/mo increase or 6,000 a year after taxes (so maybe 9 or 10k pay increase needed to keep rent the same). Do this for some other basic expenses as well, factor in commuting, but rent is by far the biggest, so in this scenario I would very roughly estimate that a 20k increase in salary would be an improvement in cost of living.

[Nobodybody]

OP - I didn't see anyone here suggest Craigslist, but you can find several rentals on that site. I would use Craigslist for the town of Natick in your negotiations, and show a few examples that demonstrate the increased amount of rent you'll have to pay as a starting point, and negotiate from there.