BellaVilla wrote: ↑Dec 04, 2020
cteclipse wrote: ↑Dec 04, 2020
^Compared to SF NYC is dirt cheap.
I have always taken the contrary opinion and believe that St. Louis is NOT cheap. When you compare any city to SF or NYC, or DC, they are all CHEAP. My wife and I have lived in other places, nearly all of our social circle are transplants, and nearly everyone we know comments that it's "fairly expensive" out here to live, especially when you look to buy a modestly nice house to live in. Sure, the stats show that it's "cheap", but in practice when you actually go to look to find a decent place to live (buy or rent) in a decent area you're quite above the statistical average. I've got friends and family all around the country to compare with and transplant opinions on other forums such as Citydata would agree with this as well.
I've been meaning to write the development agencies (I am on the regional chamber) to rethink this strategy. When I hear something is cheap, I ask why? Or in this case, may infer that's because no one wants to live there. 2 years ago they were running a 250 mile radius campaign trying to get people to relocate from smaller towns to STL. I guarantee people from rural IL, MO will get sticker shock if they are told STL is cheap.
Well, this position is empirically and anecdotally incorrect. My colleagues in Chicago are paying 2-3X my rent for less square footage.
The only thing that is expensive in St. Louis is groceries. I assume its because there isn't enough competition for Schnucks but idk.
We spent the better part of 2020 looking for a house to buy, and closed in August. I also travel for a living and for fun (52 countries, 48 states), and am pretty inquisitive to the places I visit so I feel like I have a pretty good baseline for comparisons. It's nearly impossible to define parameters as there will always be anecdotal examples one way or another, however I'll try.
Middle to Upper Middle class income. 1000-1400sqf apartments, 1600-2000sqf housing. In the city would be nicer areas of south city, dog town, around TG, CWE, midtown, grove. County would be U-City, DeMun, RH, MW, WG, Kirkwood, Sunset Hills, Crestwood, Creve Couer, fanning out that way.
My good friend in Philly lives in a first ring suburb with good schools in a modern townhome for $300k. We're originally from the Buffalo area and home prices are nearly double out here. We have friends here from Rochester and other parts of NY state who echo the same sentiment. My wife has many friends in Columbus/Akron and they were always surprised by rent/prices out here. We have multiple cousins and friends who live/lived in Brooklyn and their rents weren't far from what we were paying in CWE. We have 2 groups of friends from PHX who say it's expensive to find a comparable house in STL. My wife's cousin lives in a new build 2 bed aptmt with a pool in Charlotte for $1200/month. My friend who is in real estate just moved to Atlanta and said it's cheaper to buy a nice home in ATL than STL.
I can go on like this. I wouldn't call STL expensive per se, however I feel cheap is not accurate.
