5 ms·

Seems quite off for Seattle at least. They put housing costs for 1 adult 0 children at ~$18000, which last I checked barely covers rent for a studio, but no ot

by dmoy 3y ago

Seems quite off for Seattle at least. They put housing costs for 1 adult 0 children at ~$18000, which last I checked barely covers rent for a studio, but no other housing-related expenses (like... water/sewer/electric, which isn't cheap here either). The childcare costs seem a little suspect too. Still a cool idea.

cratermoon 3y ago
> barely covers rent for a studio Yes, that's "living", nothing more. A home. It even says in the technical documentation, "We assumed that a one adult family would rent a single occupancy unit (zero bedrooms) for an individual adult household" I can't account for your thoughts on utilities, the site says the housing includes them, but perhaps there's room to improve the data.
- dmoy 3y ago
  As sibling commenter pointed out, typing "Seattle" doesn't yield results for Seattle, but rather the whole Seattle/Tacoma metro area, which includes several places that you can get a $1500 studio plus utilities in.
  - cratermoon 3y ago
    Ah yes, that can be deceptive. Maybe some people would want to live in Tacoma and commute to Seattle to work, or WFH.
seizethecheese 3y ago
First off, I see $38,817 not $18k. Where did you get that? Second, this is for the whole Seattle/Tacoma area. This isn’t living in central Seattle. Finally, I found it to be generous from my personal experience. My partner and I were able to live in Seattle for considerably less than $60k per year this gives for two people. We had a perfectly happy, frugal, life at around $36k.
- dmoy 3y ago
  The results for 2 people definitely seemed more realistic (childcare notwithstanding)
- dmoy 3y ago
  > First off, I see $38,817 not $18k. Where did you get that? https://livingwage.mit.edu/metros/42660 https://livingwage.mit.edu/metros/42660 > Typical Expenses > > 1 Adult > > Housing > > $18,388 I'm talking about just the housing, it looks like the number you're talking about is total expenses. > Second, this is for the whole Seattle/Tacoma area. This isn’t living in central Seattle. Okay that makes more sense. You can definitely get studios for $1.5k with utilities in e.g. Renton or Kent.
  - seizethecheese 3y ago
    That clears it up. $1.5k is actually really high. The median rent according to Zillow, for just Seattle, is $2.3k and that’s all sizes of apartments. I’m suspicious of the claim here that this is minimal living costs, not closer to median cost.
    - dmoy 3y ago
      It looks like it's 40th percentile, which for the whole metro region, yea $1.5k for a studio makes sense even after you add in utilities. So much closer to median cost. $1.5k with $100-$200 of utilities, renters insurance, etc in Seattle proper gets a little more difficult to find. You could probably do it up north past greenwood, over in west seattle, or similar. If you know how to dodge the craigslist scams haha.
      - seizethecheese 3y ago
        40th percentile: interesting! Thanks for digging that up. I guess ideologically I don’t think “living wage” corresponds to 40th percentile
- selectodude 3y ago
jwestbury 3y ago
I checked for Bellingham, which is where I most recently lived in WA -- where it suggests two adults could get by on less than $1000/mo. in rent. Quite unlikely. Ten years ago, my rent for a 400 sq. ft. studio apartment in Bellingham was $850/mo. It's more like $1200/mo now. And that's assuming it's reasonable to expect two adults to share 400 sq. ft.

by dmoy 3y ago

cratermoon 3y ago

> barely covers rent for a studio Yes, that's "living", nothing more. A home. It even says in the technical documentation, "We assumed that a one adult family would rent a single occupancy unit (zero bedrooms) for an individual adult household" I can't account for your thoughts on utilities, the site says the housing includes them, but perhaps there's room to improve the data.

dmoy 3y ago
As sibling commenter pointed out, typing "Seattle" doesn't yield results for Seattle, but rather the whole Seattle/Tacoma metro area, which includes several places that you can get a $1500 studio plus utilities in.
- cratermoon 3y ago
  Ah yes, that can be deceptive. Maybe some people would want to live in Tacoma and commute to Seattle to work, or WFH.

seizethecheese 3y ago

First off, I see $38,817 not $18k. Where did you get that? Second, this is for the whole Seattle/Tacoma area. This isn’t living in central Seattle. Finally, I found it to be generous from my personal experience. My partner and I were able to live in Seattle for considerably less than $60k per year this gives for two people. We had a perfectly happy, frugal, life at around $36k.

dmoy 3y ago
The results for 2 people definitely seemed more realistic (childcare notwithstanding)
dmoy 3y ago
> First off, I see $38,817 not $18k. Where did you get that? https://livingwage.mit.edu/metros/42660 https://livingwage.mit.edu/metros/42660 > Typical Expenses > > 1 Adult > > Housing > > $18,388 I'm talking about just the housing, it looks like the number you're talking about is total expenses. > Second, this is for the whole Seattle/Tacoma area. This isn’t living in central Seattle. Okay that makes more sense. You can definitely get studios for $1.5k with utilities in e.g. Renton or Kent.
- seizethecheese 3y ago
  That clears it up. $1.5k is actually really high. The median rent according to Zillow, for just Seattle, is $2.3k and that’s all sizes of apartments. I’m suspicious of the claim here that this is minimal living costs, not closer to median cost.
  - dmoy 3y ago
    It looks like it's 40th percentile, which for the whole metro region, yea $1.5k for a studio makes sense even after you add in utilities. So much closer to median cost. $1.5k with $100-$200 of utilities, renters insurance, etc in Seattle proper gets a little more difficult to find. You could probably do it up north past greenwood, over in west seattle, or similar. If you know how to dodge the craigslist scams haha.
    - seizethecheese 3y ago
      40th percentile: interesting! Thanks for digging that up. I guess ideologically I don’t think “living wage” corresponds to 40th percentile
selectodude 3y ago

jwestbury 3y ago

I checked for Bellingham, which is where I most recently lived in WA -- where it suggests two adults could get by on less than $1000/mo. in rent. Quite unlikely. Ten years ago, my rent for a 400 sq. ft. studio apartment in Bellingham was $850/mo. It's more like $1200/mo now. And that's assuming it's reasonable to expect two adults to share 400 sq. ft.