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after living in the New England area and moving to north Dakota in 2004, I can honestly say yes, overall, North Dakota is cheaper even with me making almost 2 times what I was making out east than I do here. Out east, after paying a "reasonable" $1000 a month for a 2BR apartment, making about $55K fresh out of college, etc. The most I could look forward to affording was maybe a condo or townhome. Any housing that was not dilapitated was in the $250s plus and this was at the start of the boom, at least, the boom out there when I moved in 2000.
Anyway, I noticed the main differences was in general, food stuff cost more for the same item, taxes were more, you were taxed on more things like your car (plenty of people did the mill rate shuffle, claiming another city to keep it down). After taking a pay cut to move to ND, in the end, I have a nice house and can actually afford things now.
I also get the side benefits of not having to worry as I did about more breakin's to our cars (3 times, and I lived in what would be considered a nice neighborhood), or hoping to get in to a doctor via the emergency room (sat with my wife in one while she was having bad stomach pains for over 8 hrs, NOT KIDDING HERE). I also don't feel the need to send our children to private schools that all my colleagues did because of fear of violence or poor school performance.
There isn't as much of a "hunt" for quality schools out here, in general, they all are pretty good.
In the end, yes, you will probably win out on the money front, but when its all said and done, I guess to me, Cost of Living is more than just a few green backs.
we are moving to cogswell next month and it aint for the money.Granted money is important in these days or any days i guess,but the older you get "I" think other things are important.I love the beauty of ND and the people.Thats all I need.PPL need money and the more you have the more you can help ppl.Comes a time when you just want to step back and look at life and its many wonders.TO me nd gives us the chance.
we are moving to cogswell next month and it aint for the money.Granted money is important in these days or any days i guess,but the older you get "I" think other things are important.I love the beauty of ND and the people.Thats all I need.PPL need money and the more you have the more you can help ppl.Comes a time when you just want to step back and look at life and its many wonders.TO me nd gives us the chance.
after living in the New England area and moving to north Dakota in 2004, I can honestly say yes, overall, North Dakota is cheaper even with me making almost 2 times what I was making out east than I do here. Out east, after paying a "reasonable" $1000 a month for a 2BR apartment, making about $55K fresh out of college, etc. The most I could look forward to affording was maybe a condo or townhome. Any housing that was not dilapitated was in the $250s plus and this was at the start of the boom, at least, the boom out there when I moved in 2000.
Anyway, I noticed the main differences was in general, food stuff cost more for the same item, taxes were more, you were taxed on more things like your car (plenty of people did the mill rate shuffle, claiming another city to keep it down). After taking a pay cut to move to ND, in the end, I have a nice house and can actually afford things now.
I also get the side benefits of not having to worry as I did about more breakin's to our cars (3 times, and I lived in what would be considered a nice neighborhood), or hoping to get in to a doctor via the emergency room (sat with my wife in one while she was having bad stomach pains for over 8 hrs, NOT KIDDING HERE). I also don't feel the need to send our children to private schools that all my colleagues did because of fear of violence or poor school performance.
There isn't as much of a "hunt" for quality schools out here, in general, they all are pretty good.
In the end, yes, you will probably win out on the money front, but when its all said and done, I guess to me, Cost of Living is more than just a few green backs.
Goodness, where were you living? I haven't had any of those issues in NJ. Plenty of hospitals and the time I went to the ER I was in a room inside of 3 minutes (just tell the receptionist "Appendicitis" and they hop right to!) and they guarantee kids will see a doctor within 20 minutes of checking in (all of our trips with the kids have been within about 10 minutes).
As for crime, I've been in NJ for 11 years now and haven't had my car broken in to. Being a convertible, it wouldn't be hard. Heck, most times I leave my Nav in the front window even with the top down. Obviously there's some places I wouldn't want to do that but in North Jersey, no problems.
Your rent is right, and taxes have been discussed. Your observation of twice the income matches my argument. I'm surprised you're finding homes for half the price back in ND based on the research I did. Maybe you should have considered South Jersey where you could have found cheaper housing and kept your salary without worrying about crime?
we are moving to cogswell next month and it aint for the money.Granted money is important in these days or any days i guess,but the older you get "I" think other things are important.I love the beauty of ND and the people.Thats all I need.PPL need money and the more you have the more you can help ppl.Comes a time when you just want to step back and look at life and its many wonders.TO me nd gives us the chance.
I guess the way I look at it, I work for money, to provide a standard of life for my family. I want to go some place I can maximize that combination during my 30 odd working years. I believe upon examination, you'd find a place like South Jersey gives you a far better combination than ND. Especially in South Jersey you get all the farm land and "scenery" you would in ND with better schools, more entertainment, and far higher salaries. The downside is the higher home prices and taxes but the salary compensates for that at a much higher than dollar for dollar rate (I may pay $1,000 a month more for my home but my salary is far greater than $1,000 a month more than what it would be in ND).
To the OP, you leave out the fact that 180k a year, even if it's combined income, is far more than the average American family makes. Sure, with that kind of money, you can make the argument that NJ is just as affordable to you as ND. So what. With that kind of money, one can live in any state of any region in the country, and do just fine.
I make 40k a year. Right now, that's the total income for the family. We get by ok, drive a late-model vehicle, live in a clean, safe, suburb with good schools. Our house was less than 90k four years ago.
If I lived in New Jersey, in my line of work, I'd only make about 10k more, leaving me in basically the same price range on a house.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that in New Jersey, very few houses for less than 90k are worth living in, much less their neighborhoods. I don't even want to think about what kind of school district that affords.
If I cared about living in a so-called nationally ranked school district, I just have to go across the state line and add 20-30k to my house. I guarantee you that those schools rival anything you'll ever find in New Jersey. At one point in time, one of the high-schools over there was ranked #1 in the nation if I'm not mistaken.
I don't live in North Dakota, I live in Kansas City. My guess is that they're not that much different in terms of cost. Probably more similar to each other than either is to New Jersey. My guess is that in North Dakota, one probably doesn't have to spend 200k just to get into a good area. I don't know how much lower than that you can go in New Jersey and be in a good area.
As far as schools are concerned, I don't know where anybody gets that ND schools are among the worst. I've mostly heard the opposite. Want bad schools? Go to Arkansas. West Virginia. Mississippi. NOT North Dakota. You don't know what bad schools look like.
Far more? Not given our education level. I have 3 degrees, my wife has 2, and in NJ there are opportunities for people with that sort of education (though my wife should be making about $30k a year more if she was actually getting paid for her degrees). Am I average? I sure hope not, who'd want to be average? The argument wasn't can you live well for 90k or 180k, it was that I'd make twice as much in NJ as in ND. Few people in ND can make $90k, even combined. What's the average salary in ND, $50k for a couple? Again, I wasn't talking ND averages vs NJ.. frankly I don't know the data. All I know is my specific cases.
As for schools, I think you'd be way off. NJ offers far more AP classes than anything in ND. I spent 12 years in the ND school systems and it was painful. They do absolutely nothing to help advanced students and actually hold them back to ensure they get their 12 years worth of federal funding for the butt in the chair. If you go further and look at the % of college educated parents in NJ you'll also quickly come to realize more parents in NJ have far higher expectations of their children than what many in ND do. That tends to push test scores and school quality even higher. We could compare SAT scores but trust me, ND would come out quite poorly in comparison. And not caring about test scores is generally a cop out to knowing you're going to lose the battle. Will kids come out of ND schools able to read and add? Sure, if that's your only expectation ND will do just fine. If you want your kids to go to MIT, Yale, Harvard, Wharton, or NYU, you'd be much better off sending your kids to school in NJ.
Nemmert--
You actually forgot to mention the best reason to live in NJ--you have the very real chance of running into Bruce Springsteen in/around Rumson.
Far more? Not given our education level. I have 3 degrees, my wife has 2, and in NJ there are opportunities for people with that sort of education (though my wife should be making about $30k a year more if she was actually getting paid for her degrees). Am I average? I sure hope not, who'd want to be average? The argument wasn't can you live well for 90k or 180k, it was that I'd make twice as much in NJ as in ND. Few people in ND can make $90k, even combined. What's the average salary in ND, $50k for a couple? Again, I wasn't talking ND averages vs NJ.. frankly I don't know the data. All I know is my specific cases.
As for schools, I think you'd be way off. NJ offers far more AP classes than anything in ND. I spent 12 years in the ND school systems and it was painful. They do absolutely nothing to help advanced students and actually hold them back to ensure they get their 12 years worth of federal funding for the butt in the chair. If you go further and look at the % of college educated parents in NJ you'll also quickly come to realize more parents in NJ have far higher expectations of their children than what many in ND do. That tends to push test scores and school quality even higher. We could compare SAT scores but trust me, ND would come out quite poorly in comparison. And not caring about test scores is generally a cop out to knowing you're going to lose the battle. Will kids come out of ND schools able to read and add? Sure, if that's your only expectation ND will do just fine. If you want your kids to go to MIT, Yale, Harvard, Wharton, or NYU, you'd be much better off sending your kids to school in NJ.
I think you missed my point.
Average or not, my line of work simply doesn't pay that much. New Jersey would never be an option, because it wouldn't come close to paying enough to make up for the difference. My guess is that would be the case for many people. I still say that a neighborhood in NJ that's in my price range wouldn't be worth living in.
My pay may be average, but pay doesn't represent my self-worth. I have little desire of making six figures.
Seriously.
I'd rather enjoy what I do, whatever that pays.
As far as rural areas are concerned, you must realize that people who love North Dakota would most likely hate New Jersey and vise versa. There is no comparison. Why you try to make a comparison between the two states on any level is beyond me. Whatever is rural in New Jersey would be a joke in most parts of the country not surrounded be a megalopolis. Three acres where I'm from, would barely be the land directly around a house that stays mowed down for the dogs. Most people who live in the country have much more land than that, and don't have to pay much for it. Making big bucks also isn't the biggest priority for those people. The older you get, you realize that happiness and peace of mind come from somewhere else besides money.
I understand that some people, like myself, have issues with where they were raised. So on that note, I can see why you feel the need to vent.
As for education, I wasn't directly trying to compare ND schools to NJ schools. If anything, I was trying to make the point that you can find somewhere in this country where the schools are extremely top-notch, without the east coast price and hassle.
If you love New Jersey, that's great.
I was just saying that ND schools probably aren't nearly as bad as you might think. I spent most of my growing up years in the southeast, where kids from places like North Dakota would run circles around us academically. North Dakota schools are far from being the worst.
A lot of us could not care less about those overrated, overpriced Ivy-League schools. If you want your kid to be a condescending snob, then they're wonderful. That's really their biggest advantage. I know that they are fine academic schools, but for most people, there's not going to be much of a difference.
I think you missed my point.
Average or not, my line of work simply doesn't pay that much. New Jersey would never be an option, because it wouldn't come close to paying enough to make up for the difference. My guess is that would be the case for many people. I still say that a neighborhood in NJ that's in my price range wouldn't be worth living in.
My pay may be average, but pay doesn't represent my self-worth. I have little desire of making six figures.
Seriously.
I'd rather enjoy what I do, whatever that pays.
As far as rural areas are concerned, you must realize that people who love North Dakota would most likely hate New Jersey and vise versa. There is no comparison. Why you try to make a comparison between the two states on any level is beyond me. Whatever is rural in New Jersey would be a joke in most parts of the country not surrounded be a megalopolis. Three acres where I'm from, would barely be the land directly around a house that stays mowed down for the dogs. Most people who live in the country have much more land than that, and don't have to pay much for it. Making big bucks also isn't the biggest priority for those people. The older you get, you realize that happiness and peace of mind come from somewhere else besides money.
I understand that some people, like myself, have issues with where they were raised. So on that note, I can see why you feel the need to vent.
As for education, I wasn't directly trying to compare ND schools to NJ schools. If anything, I was trying to make the point that you can find somewhere in this country where the schools are extremely top-notch, without the east coast price and hassle.
If you love New Jersey, that's great.
I was just saying that ND schools probably aren't nearly as bad as you might think. I spent most of my growing up years in the southeast, where kids from places like North Dakota would run circles around us academically. North Dakota schools are far from being the worst.
A lot of us could not care less about those overrated, overpriced Ivy-League schools. If you want your kid to be a condescending snob, then they're wonderful. That's really their biggest advantage. I know that they are fine academic schools, but for most people, there's not going to be much of a difference.
Honestly than, I applaud you for realizing what your line of work does pay and making a decision to live somewhere that allows you to enjoy a lifestyle you're comfortable with doing the sort of work you do. Too often I hear people complain about what they "should" be making and what they "should" be able to do. There is definitely a greater sense of entitlement in people on the East Coast and it makes me a bit nauteous at times.
I think if you compare South Jersey to ND cities, you'll find a pretty strong correlation. Sure, the ND boonies are far FAR more remote than the NJ boonies but I didn't grow up in the boonies of ND. The comparison was more for people in Bismarck, Minot, Fargo, etc and why they would choose to live there based on the fallacy of a better life due to the lower cost of living. If you're comfortable in any of the decent sized cities of ND, you'd be comfortable in South Jersey.
As for schools... again, I went to school in ND. In my experience and opinion, ND schools don't support dreams. People with extreme ambition and lofty goals are going to be sorely neglected by a ND education. While I'm sure the South is in worse shape, ND is far from a "good" education. I didn't take a math class my Senior year of high school. I'd taken every math class they offered at the end of my Junior year. That definitely made my college math placement test interesting 14 months later
As for the elite schools... the advantage isn't the education, it's the connections, the alumni network. People won't hire me because I went to NYU, people would hire me because they also went to NYU. NYU hosts events where I can rub shoulders with some of the most powerful business people in the country. Having that sort of network is definitely helpful for people who are ambituous.
Lastly, I don't hate ND. I am simply trying to dispell the illusion that you (generically) can enjoy a higher standard of living in ND due to the lower cost of living. The cost of living for most (I don't know what you do that you believe your earnings are capped) isn't much if any lower than other parts of the country (South Jersey specifically) when you take into account the lack of earning power in ND. North Dakota does have it's positives, the big one being a completely slow paced, low pressure way of living. People work their 40 hours, punch out right on cue, and are out the doors, home for supper, and with their families. They aren't worried about what they didn't get to, what the next day holds at work, or other things, they are at peace with their jobs and their lives.
Interesting on the math class in high school story--my son is an 8th grader in the Fargo Public Schools. Currently he starts his day at one of the high schools taking Algebra II w/ class full of juniors and seniors. His teachers and advisors have mapped out his math courses for the next four years. By the time he is a junior, they plan on him taking advantage of the dual credit system. He'll be taking calculus at one of the colleges/universities in town, earning credits for both high school and college simultaneously. Perhaps that wasn't available when you were here, but our experience w/ Fargo's Gifted & Talented program is that the only thing that would hold you back is your willingness to work and challenge yourself.
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