We actually lived in Costa Rica during 2004-2009, bought a home there for $39,000 and lived on $1,000/month SS check. Things have changed a lot since then - cost of living has soared, along with crime and other woes. Too bad - nice country and people, but not much "Pura Vida" anymore !
I remember in 2007 when I was working in real estate seeing people buy homes new from builders with the intention of selling before close of escrow to a new buyer for profit. The crash was so brutal and fast that I remember seeing a lot of these units foreclosed on with the builder plastic still on the carpet.
Most people find it difficult to handle a fall since they are used to bull markets, but if you know where to look and how to maneuver, you can make a size-able profit. Depending on how you intend to enter and exit, yes.
The enduring US stock market bull run evokes a mix of fear and excitement, presenting opportunities with insight, resulting in $780k gains in the past ten months, utilizing a portfolio advisor for a well-defined strategy.
I'd love to see a video on the quietest towns in America. The older I get the more I appreciate peace and quiet. No airports, no railroad tracks, and the toughest anti-noise laws. I'd move there today.
I moved 20 miles to get out of traffic and away from ambulance sirens. I'm still 10 minutes from anything I need but I'm in the boonies. I can occasionally hear trucks on a nearby highway during winter when the leaves are gone. The biggest noise out here are the "sound of freedom" when Ft Benning(now Ft Moore) is practicing. I love the sound of automatic gunfire.
Most of these have seen here, but when there is an update these days, we come back for Briggs. His narration, enthusiasm, humor, voice inflections, format I find, is beyond entertaining. “Be nice to each other,” we like that.
Tulsa, Oklahoma City and Wichita are excellent choices and they are in the general area of where I moved. I'd actually look for a quiet town of about 15k people within 30 minutes of these cities for nice homes starting at $80k (My buddy just paid $50k for a 3 bed/2bath Ranch Style home on half an acre that needed very minor repairs). They also have the best overall weather from this list (except for the occasional tornado every 100 years or so). Just sell your stuff, pack your car and go!!
🎉🎉 Yes I just moved to Pittsburgh, from Southern California and boy oh boy is it affordable here I bought a nice two bedroom for 100k so very cheap to live here.
There are neighborhoods in El Paso that are on the western slopes of the Franklin Mountains. The elevation is 4,600 feet, so the temps are much more mild than down in the valley. Plus, great sunsets.
My coworker lives there, he can't get out fast enough. It's been 100+ degrees for 40 days straight, and it's monsoon season so not dry heat right now either. The crime is also a major issue in El Paso.
I lived in El Paso and loved it and didn't have any issues with crime or safety. It's still affordable there. We lived in the country on acres.we live abroad now but if we had to return we would go back to EL Paso
Columbus and Pittsburgh would be interesting. To be honest, I think a lot of the cities on the list will see a boom over the next 10-20 years simply due to inflation. All the desirable cities are getting really expensive! If you look back at the type of list in the 2000’s, it was Charlotte, Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, Austin, Nashville, etc. None of those places are cheap anymore. They may seem affordable compared to Cali, NY, and a few other places on the coast, but that’s it.
That and the Google data centers there now will bring people in (including me) I lived in Columbus for a bit and loved it. the affordability and the potential it has right now attracts me alot, people complain because its not the most exciting city with a personality but its a solid city to be in , so many pros to it. Even willing to leave Florida for it.@@amylee9
Cincinnatus was the first Roman Senator to be declared Dictator. Three times when Rome was attacked, he was elected dictator with full powers of government for 6 months each time. Each time he did his duty. Then, when his time was up, he went back to his farm.
Cincinnati was named for George Washington, who, after the Revolutionary War, retired to his farm, but was called out of retirement to serve as president of the Constitutional Convention and, subsequently, first president of the US.
Cool! The face behind the voice! As I prepare to move from Hawaii to Pennsylvania, I find your videos very informative and as a veteran appreciate your point of view.
As someone from Birmingham the crime is sooo easily avoidable and the majority of it happens in areas where the average person would never have to go or even commute through. I live in Baton Rouge now and the whole city feels unsafe, I’ve moved to 3 different neighborhoods in Baton Rouge and finally I have a house where I don’t hear gunshots regularly throughout the week. Can’t wait to move back to Birmingham. But also take us off this list you’re gonna drive the prices up!
Born and lived in Bham AL for 64 years, now moved to So. Alabama, smaller town. Not as inexpensive as this video makes out. Average 2 br apt expect start at $ 2000 a mo, First time home buyer, expect $250-300K and that is a neighborhood you would actually want to live in. Crime is mostly in areas you would not go but can happen anywhere. Jobs that pay where you left from, not easy to find and be willing for a cut in pay, tech jobs may not be as numerous as where you left. As for schools, in the more affluent areas, they will be safer and better. People in Bham are friendly, but, if you are a die hard liberal, leave that mentality where you left, you will like and fit in better especially with what is going on these days. Bham is in the Deep South, was, is and will stay conservative. Being a college football fan, especially AL, a nice plus.
As a 67 yo former resident, now residing 3 years in Montgomery area, you move back to Bham, get ready for higher prices for rent and homes in areas you would actually want to live in not to mention a lengthy commute. Also, as far as job market and pay scale, when moving to one of these cities listed here, expect a cut in pay, possibly significant, and a much smaller job market, especially with tech jobs and if your moving from a very large city where there are more jobs that pay more. Also, these cities have a more conservative laid back lifestyle, better suited for families and older adults, die hard liberal activists tend not to stay long.
Inland SC has nice pockets but for the most part its a redneck shithole. Columbia isn't terrible, but still...meh. Cheap for a reason. I used to live in Charleston and wouldn't live anywhere else in SC. Even Charleston is a major shithole just north of the peninsula. Mount Pleasant and some of the other suburbs are nice.
Hey Briggs, I know this may sound weird, but it's great to see you in person at the start of your videos. Also, one other consideration is what the wages are in that city. What people really want is the best after tax wages to living costs ratio.
I lived in Dayton for 3 years and enjoyed it there. Every time I went to Columbus, cloudy. As I get older, weather is big for me. I enjoyed Kings Island and Cincy. Skyline Chili!
Dayton can be really nice in select enclaves and pockets, many of which can be far away from the stereotypically rich Southeast Side burbs. Ex. Germantown. Clayton. Pockets of Springfield South of 70 / adjacent to the protected lands around Yellow Springs. There's also a kind of old school, comical wasp'ish culture within select enclaves and pockets. Even with some black people in places like Centerville. Sometimes you just hear it in people's dialects.
OK City also has FAA and Air Traffic Controller training. Yes it’s high stress but the pay is incredible plus they are predicting a shortage in the next 10 years.
Yes they just had an ad announcing theyre hiring air traffic controllers here. My uncle retired from the FAA and was able to do so at a really nice age. I also have a couple of close friends who work their and will be retiring with a very nice pension.
Do you know if they would be looking at adjusting the max age requirements? Air traffic control is something I was curious about. I've been an emergency dispatcher for 5 years so I'm pretty confident I could handle the stress and frantic pace. Unfortunetly I'm also 36 this September which is well over the max age I've seen being advertized.
@@stevena3871true that. I spent one brief night in SH it was the bomb. But as a 4O+ year Austin TX resident yep, I must agree. Talking about it is like buying the biggest one in the store then paying someone to shove it up your…etc.
@@stevena3871there is nothing cheap about Shsker Hts and Beachwood. Shsker property taxes 4% - you pay every year and houses are easy $500K - how about $20K/year taxes? In Beachwood there is not high taxes but you can’t buy anything cheaper than $300K. The city survived 2008 foreclosures without damage - because of synagogues….they support the community If you can afford Beachwood - look no further - it’s the safest as it can be.
I can vouch for OKC, move to the metro area like Edmond, Mustang, Yukon, Newcastle. Real cheap, plenty of lakes, great Mexican food. More diversity than you would expect
Love your videos. I’d love to see an analysis of small/medium affordable towns that were once booming 100+ years ago. Those are towns that I think a lot of people will move to when looking for an affordable place with rich history and building stock. Now that many people can work remotely I believe people will look to move and revitalize these towns.
when I went back to Dayton, Ohio in 2021 for my 50 year high school reunion, I learned that the average price of a home was $61,500. Top that for a metro area with 800,000 people and a symphony Orchestra and Art Institute! I'd move back except for the cold winters and myself being spoiled by 45 years of LA climate. I still think about it all the time due to the horrible homeless problem here around me.
I live in the Dayton area. The house price you quoted are in the awful neighborhoods. If you want to live in the suburbs you will pay 200-250k. Work is also a bit difficult to get. Cincinnati is the job hub here which includes long commute times. You are otherwise correct.
Crazy to me that Louisville is affordable because I live there and it doesn’t feel like it as a local…really makes me wonder how people everywhere else are making it.
It's al relative. Cities that are more expensive tend to have jobs that offer a chance to make more, all else being equal, but real estate tends to become manifestly more expensive. As far as "how do people make it?" It's a good question. In more expensive locales you can make a decent living, but it may take you longer to reach certain milestones. Longer to move out of the family home, you may need to share a place with a roommate till later, may not have a car for a while, etc.
I lived In Louisville in early 2010s and that was affordable. I lived decently on a graduate student stipend of less than $25k a year. I was paying $550 for a large one bedroom all utilities included. Everyday essentials were MUCH cheaper
If you're coming from the New England States or California, just about anywhere else in the country is cheaper. We have a saying in New Hampshire. " Make it in Massachusetts, spend it in New Hampshire". Same thing, just a different geographical area.
@@k.s.9400 sorry I didn't but he did say to make a guess of what cities made the list before watching. I got sidetracked and never finished watching the video.
I'm an insurance agent in Wichita. Yeah our insurance prices are high, but property taxes are low. My parents live in the suburbs of Chicago and we compared our escrow accounts. While my homeowners insurance is about double theirs, the taxes they pay are more than my insurance and taxes combined.
OKC has a ridiculous skyline. Why build the one skyscraper that is sooo much taller than the others? It's OKC for God's sake. Not like the skyline is ever going to reach that height again. WTH were they thinking? A bunch of much smaller high-rises as in-fill would have been much more effective at densifying the skyline...which would have made for a much more impressive skyline overall.🙄
You should do income per Capita ratio vs cost of living. The kind of application for just cheap living is only good for retired, wealthy or remote workers. You can get even crazier and add crime stats and incarcerations per Capita to find out if you have problems with people vs problems with over policing.
Cincinnati got its name from Quinctius Cincinnatus ( c. 519 - c. 430 BC) was a Roman patrician, statesman, and military leader of the early Roman Republic who became a legendary figure of Roman virtue.
I would flip the order. Cincy, Pittsburgh, Columbus, El Paso at the top, Wichita, Birmingham, Columbia at the bottom. The midwest is just so underrated.
@@AmericanScout-USAAgrée, Indianapolis is very cheap, back in 2015 a 2000 sq ft house was 140-150K dollars, Even now it’s like under 250-300K for a 2000 sq ft house.
A lot of single people can't afford $200+k homes, even if they live and work in an "affordable" city. Even Pittsburgh isn't really affordable anymore for a lot of people. Listings may look cheap, but if you offer asking price you're not getting the house.
Yea, in the county where I live in Texas over half the starter homes last year where bought by wall street private equity firms. It’s almost like they are asking for the pitch forks at this point.
lol, you can get a good home for less than $100k that is less than 30 minutes outside of most of these cities. My buddy paid $50k for his and I paid $39k for mine but mine needed about $10k in repairs.
I've been looking at both the Oklahoma City area as well as the greater Tulsa area, particularly Broken Arrow. I have a friend that lives there. Little things like that matter! 😊
Was born in Birmingham. The reason the median home price in the city is 104k is because nearly the entire city is slums. What happened to Birmingham is the nicer parts of the city became their own cities. For example the median home price in Mountain Brook is 995k, but that city used to just be a part of Birmingham. Nearly every nice neighborhood/area of Birmingham became its own city(Homewood, Mountain Brook, Vestavia Hills, etc) and what's left is low income neighborhoods and the downtown area.
Thank you for the website suggestion. My family is selling our house as it’s under threat to be taken by the IRS because we can’t afford the property taxes. It’s entirely paid off, so once it’s sold, we can hopefully keep the money to put toward another place to stay. This video was incredibly helpful and informative, and I thank you for it!
Total BS. Property taxes are through the state not federal and every state is different. Property taxes on my house and land is equal to one Starbucks coffee a week for a year.
If your family can't afford the property tax on a paid off house, it's either a super expensive house or your parents are complete bums/have massive medical expenses. Property tax on a really nice house in most states is half the cost of a 1 bedroom apartment.
Tulsa or northwest Arkansas are pretty good and not extremely overpriced. El Paso suffered from car air pollution from Juarez since they share a valley and cars were often stolen for parts and taken across the border, but that's been several years. The Texas triangle is where the jobs are largely with Waco and Temple being relatively affordable options for remote or hybrid remote workers.
The crime in north Killeen and KISD, except maybe for Harker Heights, keep many away. Though, south Killeen is a good value and has a nice new hike and bike trail and I-14 makes reaching stores easy and Belton/Temple a fairly short trip.
@@bonesandbells yup! Im in Waco , I love Killeen but its sketchy as hell . Beautiful women around and cheap rent. I would choose Harker Heights or Belton due to Killeen's sketchiness
Since you've started showing your face, my idea of what you look like has been shattered! LOL Greetings from southern Maine, love your channel, always informative and fun!
Greetings Briggs, the travel nurse from Baltimore here again... I just wanted to drop a comment because I recently finished an assignment out in Wichita and believe it or not I fell in love with the place! The native Kansans I met couldnt understand why lol but I liked it so much that I renewed my initial 13 week work contract by 8 weeks. I worked/stayed out there from February until just a couple of weeks ago and your description was spot on. Laid back vibe, low cost of living and decent neighbors. The people I met and worked with at one of the hospitals out there were really nice people. While in the midwest I visited Kansas City, hit a rodeo down in Oklahoma City with some friends and also found several places to buy really beautiful Native American jewelry. And did I mention they truly know what to do with barbecue out in the Midwest? The BBQ was pretty good everywhere; only thing I missed from home was decent crab cakes! That was my only complaint about Wichita actually... 😂 Keep it up with the cool videos!
I’m so split on videos like this. On one hand thanks for putting info out to people so they can find better places to live. On the other hand TH-camrs telling the rest of the country the middle of the country is more affordable runs our cost here up.
Mr. Briggs. Great video as always. I was wondering if Albuquerque, New Mexico is a reasonably cheap place to live. I've only been there once but I really liked it. Thanks
@@AaronSmith-kr5yf Huntsville is still a relatively cheap city. Great houses for only 400K, maybe less. West side of Houston is 600K+ now for something good.
Cincinnati is named after Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus...a Roman statesman who lived between 519 BC And 430 BC. He was a farmer who was drafted into leadership during an invasion that lasted only 16 days. After the victory, he went right back to farming.
I live in Birmingham,al its not as cheap as this video makes it out. It's extremely hard to find a job here that pays a livable wage. A decent house here isn't 100k its more like 250k to 300k plus your wage is low.
Right! More like 350-550k+ for a decent house in a decent location, and there’s nowhere you can rent/live on minimum wage (not even in the bad areas).😪
Idk about that,there are alot of people that live 45 minutes to an hour away and drive to Birmingham for work. Same for Huntsville, there are 40,000 people working on redstone arsenal but alot of them live an hour away from Huntsville and DO NOT want to live in Huntsville.
I have family that lives in Columbus and nearby in the cornfields. Nice city, plenty to do there, great restaurant/bar scene, good paying jobs. Interesting thing is you can drive 10-15 miles from downtown and be in the sticks, wall to wall corn. Great place to live if you want 3 or 10 acres on the somewhat cheap but still near downtown.
Columbus is nice and was 10 degrees cooler that Birmingham today. But Columbus is nice- fun town to visit. Lots to do. Many free events, pretty nice people, College town vibe. great food and reasonable prices. Highly recommended.
Columbus, OH used to be affordable. Now it's getting expensive. The real estate market went up more than 300% compared to 5 years ago. with the Intel microchip company coming to Columbus the house that used to be around 100k in the past is worth 400K this day.
I have another video idea, do the 10 cities manufacturing jobs leaving China back to the US recently are relocating to. It would be interesting to see if some of the Rust Belt places get revived after this trend.
Large and small Corporations are moving to Mexico and have been for a decade or more. Wayyyy cheaper to transport goods over land as opposed to over seas or aircraft. China has some glaring problems financially..the cracks are showing no matter what the Govt. says. Mexico is prospering in a huge way. Why? They did not and do not print money like most of the world has done AND Mexico's currency is backed by gold and silver. Imagine that...A prospering country backs their currency with precious metals and they prosper immensely. Mexico is the new China.
@debra1363 They don't want to support an economic, manufacturing and military adversary. China is a global threat acting like the old British Empire around the world. They're Our Enemy. Them and the Russians would like to destroy the Western Civilization. The see us as an existencial threat
I was there for 4 nights 18 months ago for some cheap dental work across the border. I only saw one other white guy the entire time and he was there for dental work also. I made the mistake of going to the Walmart that had the shooting and people were staring at me with fear in their eyes. I went out the entrance only door and set off an alarm. Someone yelled "shoot him". I home things have gotten better as I am headed back for more dental work at the end of the month.
So from your clues on living in SoCal......I know where your from. I worked at HelLax for 27yrs. I'm still here in the South Bay, tons of building, more traffic, and less smoggy days. I really enjoy your videos, and love your sarcasm! Keep up the good works.
For at least two decades, I dreamt of the ultimate road trip - driving a vintage muscle car through the heartland from the Pacific to the Atlantic. Its depressing to see America in 2023 through the lens of many TH-camrs, and I fear that many parts of Canada may not be far behind. Addiction is a cancer.
@@thomgt4 I wouldnt travel halfway around the world and miss the chance to see NYC and Chicago, if only for the architecture, but that can happen BEFORE the road trip :D
There is I live in a small town in Georgia with 10k people and there is zombies doped up on everything, its not just in cities like the media wants you to believe, its everywhere, this country needs some serious help@@BlackDoveNYC
Columbia, SC is good for those under 40 with a good income. I moved there from Syracuse NY for a job promotion (also went to Basic Training at Ft. Jackson many years ago). I have since retired and not real happy living here.
Without knowing what the average salary is in those areas, you can't really determine it's affordability. If you don't make as much a cheaper house is still as relatively expensive.
This is a very underrated reply. THIS is key! If you have to take a 25% pay cut to live in these places, you better make sure that EVERYTHING you buy is 25% less. But 9 times out of 10, it isn't that way.
Agree with El Paso; did a lot of trucking out of there. On a humorous note, Cincinnati was once named Porkopolis back in the 1800's due to the abundance of swine roaming around. Over the Rhine is fun to visit. Wichita has huge aerospace presence with Cessna and Beechcraft in town.
I've lived in both Wichita and Birmingham, the nos. 1 and 2. I agree with you about Wichita but not so much Birmingham. Wichita is a really underrated place. I had a two-bedroom apartment for $480 a month, and the landlord always said the rent might go up, but it never did in over three years. It was so flat that it was easy to bicycle everywhere in Wichita. I even went to a couple of operas on my bike! Birmingham is a wonderful place, but I suspect your statistics may be skewed. The reason the median home price is only $100,000 is that there are a lot of neighborhoods where you can't give away houses for free. A lot of houses have been abandoned, sometimes after they're paid off, because the owner couldn't afford to take care of them. Those are neighborhoods where the residents are African Americans. I remember there was an entire apartment complex in one of those areas that was being offered for $10,000! I wonder if they were ever able to sell it. In a more upscale area, a closed apartment complex was offered for $1.6 million. Even though the plumbing had failed, and it would've cost any buyer hundreds of thousands to fix it. There are nice black neighborhoods where houses are well maintained, but a lot of them are economically depressed. One problem is the city needs a higher minimum wage. The city council tried to raise our minimum wage to $10 a hour a few years ago, and the state refused to let them do it. We now have the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour. I say Birmingham is a wonderful place because it is quite pretty and wooded, and there are lot of amenities. But I think your real estate price figures are skewed.
Thats not the only reason he is mistaken about Birmingham. It's hot and it's HUMID. Electricity prices can hit 60 cents a kilowatt hour on a hot afternoon thanks to Alabama Power time of use metering. National average is 14 cents. Crime murder drug abuse are common place. Stopping for a red light in Birmingham is likely to get you beat up -really. Don't stop for a red light -no one else will and you, and all the pissed off people behind you, will have to sit and wait at your green light because no one else will stop. Birmingham is a ZOO!
@@fecat93 I lived there from 2001 to 2004. I remember Boeing was already starting to cut down their presence a little at that time. What has the loss of engineers done to Wichita?
@@tedgemberling2359 I left in 1989 and my father was required to move by Boeing shortly thereafter. Philadelphia or Hunstville, AL and he chose to retire with on the Space Station project. I wonder if they had a secondary cutdown in the 2000s
Pittsburgh, with a proper urban environment, decent public transport coverage, some level of walkability, okay crime stats and at least some education and tech... Seems like a wonderful place for affordable living.
The show stopper for Pennsylvania is the high school district taxes. Real estate and school district taxes together may still be less than real estate alone in New Hampshire, but over 3K a year on top of real estate taxes that are already higher than in Virginia when comparing rural areas and similar house values is just a big hit. It might be OK as IRA income isn't taxed in PA, it would depend on your IRA income. We spent several years deciding where to retire, and so many places have surprise taxes that don't make most lists, you have to dig to find out the real cost to live in many states, towns, or counties.
10. Columbus, OH 9. Cincinnati, OH 8. Louisville, KY 7. Pittsburg, PA 6. Columbia, SC 5. El Paso, TX 4. Oklahoma City, OK 3. Tulsa, OK 2. Wichita, KS 1. Birmingham, AL
I live in Covington, KY right across the bridge from Cincinnati. I’d move here over Cincinnati. House prices are better and they’re nicer. Plus, if you wanna go downtown, it’s a 5 minute drive to downtown Cincinnati!
The American dollar goes a lot further in other countries, iam retiring overseas next month
We actually lived in Costa Rica during 2004-2009, bought a home there for $39,000 and lived on $1,000/month SS check. Things have changed a lot since then - cost of living has soared, along with crime and other woes. Too bad - nice country and people, but not much "Pura Vida" anymore !
Where are you going where it would be safe?
Smart idea. Honestly not a bad idea if you choose wisely
Dont come to Brazil. The violence here is part of brazilians citizens. Im moving out. Im tired to live in fear
@@CleiderninoThat's because you need a second amendment over there. Thow out lulu!
I remember in 2007 when I was working in real estate seeing people buy homes new from builders with the intention of selling before close of escrow to a new buyer for profit. The crash was so brutal and fast that I remember seeing a lot of these units foreclosed on with the builder plastic still on the carpet.
Most people find it difficult to handle a fall since they are used to bull markets, but if you know where to look and how to maneuver, you can make a size-able profit. Depending on how you intend to enter and exit, yes.
The enduring US stock market bull run evokes a mix of fear and excitement, presenting opportunities with insight, resulting in $780k gains in the past ten months, utilizing a portfolio advisor for a well-defined strategy.
How do I reach out to one? my assets have been struggling since 2022 and I’ve been holding on by the skin of my teeth.
Research and contact Sharon Lee Peoples and follow her directions.
Just ran an online search on her name and came across her websiite; pretty well educated. thank you for sharing.
Hello from Pittsburgh! Can confirm - quite affordable here :) Really enjoy living here; glad to see our city on the list!
I'd love to see a video on the quietest towns in America. The older I get the more I appreciate peace and quiet. No airports, no railroad tracks, and the toughest anti-noise laws. I'd move there today.
Pretty sure its in Wyoming!
Tennessee
I moved 20 miles to get out of traffic and away from ambulance sirens. I'm still 10 minutes from anything I need but I'm in the boonies. I can occasionally hear trucks on a nearby highway during winter when the leaves are gone.
The biggest noise out here are the "sound of freedom" when Ft Benning(now Ft Moore) is practicing. I love the sound of automatic gunfire.
@@davidgarcia5593 I forgot all about Alaska! 🤯
@@jdollar5852 as long as it’s not being fired in your direction! 🤣
Most of these have seen here, but when there is an update these days, we come back for Briggs. His narration, enthusiasm, humor, voice inflections, format I find, is beyond entertaining.
“Be nice to each other,” we like that.
Tulsa, Oklahoma City and Wichita are excellent choices and they are in the general area of where I moved. I'd actually look for a quiet town of about 15k people within 30 minutes of these cities for nice homes starting at $80k (My buddy just paid $50k for a 3 bed/2bath Ranch Style home on half an acre that needed very minor repairs). They also have the best overall weather from this list (except for the occasional tornado every 100 years or so). Just sell your stuff, pack your car and go!!
This is what I'm looking for...near a big city but smaller & cheaper...
🎉🎉 Yes I just moved to Pittsburgh, from Southern California and boy oh boy is it affordable here I bought a nice two bedroom for 100k so very cheap to live here.
There are neighborhoods in El Paso that are on the western slopes of the Franklin Mountains. The elevation is 4,600 feet, so the temps are much more mild than down in the valley. Plus, great sunsets.
El Paso is blast
My coworker lives there, he can't get out fast enough. It's been 100+ degrees for 40 days straight, and it's monsoon season so not dry heat right now either. The crime is also a major issue in El Paso.
I live in El Paso. Crime is not a major problem.
I lived in El Paso and loved it and didn't have any issues with crime or safety. It's still affordable there. We lived in the country on acres.we live abroad now but if we had to return we would go back to EL Paso
@@OtisFlintit's the desert it has been happening for 10s thousands of years!😅
Columbus and Pittsburgh would be interesting. To be honest, I think a lot of the cities on the list will see a boom over the next 10-20 years simply due to inflation. All the desirable cities are getting really expensive! If you look back at the type of list in the 2000’s, it was Charlotte, Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, Austin, Nashville, etc. None of those places are cheap anymore. They may seem affordable compared to Cali, NY, and a few other places on the coast, but that’s it.
I’m surprised Birmingham is on this list due to spillover demand from Atlanta being relatively close
Chip manufacturing coming to Columbus will make it blow up…
Very accurate assessment
Pittsburgh is really a nice city. Very affordable and safe excluding the inner city. You can get a nice home at a good price
That and the Google data centers there now will bring people in (including me) I lived in Columbus for a bit and loved it. the affordability and the potential it has right now attracts me alot, people complain because its not the most exciting city with a personality but its a solid city to be in , so many pros to it. Even willing to leave Florida for it.@@amylee9
Cincinnatus was the first Roman Senator to be declared Dictator. Three times when Rome was attacked, he was elected dictator with full powers of government for 6 months each time. Each time he did his duty. Then, when his time was up, he went back to his farm.
If we could ONLY get quality LEADERS like that in the USA !
@@marytica123 except , not a dictator
Spot on! I was going to say what you did but you beat me to it.
Cincinnati was named for George Washington, who, after the Revolutionary War, retired to his farm, but was called out of retirement to serve as president of the Constitutional Convention and, subsequently, first president of the US.
@@marytica123 For anyone who non-sarcastically does want an Absolute Ruler, allow me to volunteer. My first command to them: Shut up.
Cool! The face behind the voice! As I prepare to move from Hawaii to Pennsylvania, I find your videos very informative and as a veteran appreciate your point of view.
As someone from Birmingham the crime is sooo easily avoidable and the majority of it happens in areas where the average person would never have to go or even commute through. I live in Baton Rouge now and the whole city feels unsafe, I’ve moved to 3 different neighborhoods in Baton Rouge and finally I have a house where I don’t hear gunshots regularly throughout the week. Can’t wait to move back to Birmingham. But also take us off this list you’re gonna drive the prices up!
First mistake is moving to Alabama
Briggs: "You're right. Baton Rouge it is."
Thanks I think Birmingham is beautiful city.
Born and lived in Bham AL for 64 years, now moved to So. Alabama, smaller town. Not as inexpensive as this video makes out. Average 2 br apt expect start at $ 2000 a mo, First time home buyer, expect $250-300K and that is a neighborhood you would actually want to live in. Crime is mostly in areas you would not go but can happen anywhere. Jobs that pay where you left from, not easy to find and be willing for a cut in pay, tech jobs may not be as numerous as where you left. As for schools, in the more affluent areas, they will be safer and better. People in Bham are friendly, but, if you are a die hard liberal, leave that mentality where you left, you will like and fit in better especially with what is going on these days. Bham is in the Deep South, was, is and will stay conservative. Being a college football fan, especially AL, a nice plus.
As a 67 yo former resident, now residing 3 years in Montgomery area, you move back to Bham, get ready for higher prices for rent and homes in areas you would actually want to live in not to mention a lengthy commute. Also, as far as job market and pay scale, when moving to one of these cities listed here, expect a cut in pay, possibly significant, and a much smaller job market, especially with tech jobs and if your moving from a very large city where there are more jobs that pay more. Also, these cities have a more conservative laid back lifestyle, better suited for families and older adults, die hard liberal activists tend not to stay long.
Looked up Colombia South Carolina and I was shook, to say the least. Your content is life changing.
Inland SC has nice pockets but for the most part its a redneck shithole. Columbia isn't terrible, but still...meh. Cheap for a reason. I used to live in Charleston and wouldn't live anywhere else in SC. Even Charleston is a major shithole just north of the peninsula. Mount Pleasant and some of the other suburbs are nice.
@@OtisFlint The laws, and their enforcement in South Carolina suck. It's the only place I know of that's worse than Alabama.
@@OtisFlint Thank you for that!
I was really disappointed to find out there is no Buttcrack Oklahoma.
And, yet, there must be a reason why “Oklahoma” rhymes with “aroma”.
There is. I see it everywhere. Whenever they bow down to catch catfish with their barehands.
I promptly googled it when he said it, and I was disappointed as well.
every city in Oklahoma should be call butt crack
ALL OF OKLA IS BUTTCRACK
Love your content. You save me so much time rather than researching on my own a variety of topics that are important to me at this stage in my life.
I live in one. Retired to Johnstown PA from DC and paid 28k for a 2-unit! That’s about 5% of the cost for metro dc
I can confirm Cincy as actually pretty great nowadays. Lots of growth lately.
Cincinnati has an amazing skyline! Every American should see it! Coming from the South on I71... WOW! Beautiful
Oh finally a face to the voice!!! Love you're channel keep up the great work!👍🏽
Hey Briggs, I know this may sound weird, but it's great to see you in person at the start of your videos.
Also, one other consideration is what the wages are in that city. What people really want is the best after tax wages to living costs ratio.
Yeah, and he doesn’t look anything like I thought he would!
I lived in Dayton for 3 years and enjoyed it there. Every time I went to Columbus, cloudy. As I get older, weather is big for me. I enjoyed Kings Island and Cincy. Skyline Chili!
Skyline chili is baby crap on pasta. Gross.
Love Skyline! and Dayton really offers great quality of life.
Dayton can be really nice in select enclaves and pockets, many of which can be far away from the stereotypically rich Southeast Side burbs.
Ex. Germantown. Clayton. Pockets of Springfield South of 70 / adjacent to the protected lands around Yellow Springs.
There's also a kind of old school, comical wasp'ish culture within select enclaves and pockets. Even with some black people in places like Centerville. Sometimes you just hear it in people's dialects.
OK City also has FAA and Air Traffic Controller training. Yes it’s high stress but the pay is incredible plus they are predicting a shortage in the next 10 years.
Yes they just had an ad announcing theyre hiring air traffic controllers here. My uncle retired from the FAA and was able to do so at a really nice age. I also have a couple of close friends who work their and will be retiring with a very nice pension.
Do you know if they would be looking at adjusting the max age requirements? Air traffic control is something I was curious about. I've been an emergency dispatcher for 5 years so I'm pretty confident I could handle the stress and frantic pace. Unfortunetly I'm also 36 this September which is well over the max age I've seen being advertized.
Shaker heights/ Beachwood are great options for anyone looking around Cleveland!
The first rule about keeping Cleveland cheap is to not talk about Cleveland being cheap.
@@stevena3871true that. I spent one brief night in SH it was the bomb. But as a 4O+ year Austin TX resident yep, I must agree. Talking about it is like buying the biggest one in the store then paying someone to shove it up your…etc.
@@stevena3871there is nothing cheap about Shsker Hts and Beachwood.
Shsker property taxes 4% - you pay every year and houses are easy $500K - how about $20K/year taxes?
In Beachwood there is not high taxes but you can’t buy anything cheaper than $300K. The city survived 2008 foreclosures without damage - because of synagogues….they support the community
If you can afford Beachwood - look no further - it’s the safest as it can be.
I can vouch for OKC, move to the metro area like Edmond, Mustang, Yukon, Newcastle. Real cheap, plenty of lakes, great Mexican food. More diversity than you would expect
Man I miss the Mexican food there I was stationed on tinker afb I remember when they first opened toby Keith's bar and grill in brick town
Love your videos. I’d love to see an analysis of small/medium affordable towns that were once booming 100+ years ago. Those are towns that I think a lot of people will move to when looking for an affordable place with rich history and building stock. Now that many people can work remotely I believe people will look to move and revitalize these towns.
Great video! Thank you for all your hard work put into these videos 😄
My pleasure!
Briggs, have long loved your videos. Great to finally see your face!
when I went back to Dayton, Ohio in 2021 for my 50 year high school reunion, I learned that the average price of a home was $61,500. Top that for a metro area with 800,000 people and a symphony Orchestra and Art Institute! I'd move back except for the cold winters and myself being spoiled by 45 years of LA climate. I still think about it all the time due to the horrible homeless problem here around me.
I live in the Dayton area. The house price you quoted are in the awful neighborhoods. If you want to live in the suburbs you will pay 200-250k. Work is also a bit difficult to get. Cincinnati is the job hub here which includes long commute times. You are otherwise correct.
Crazy to me that Louisville is affordable because I live there and it doesn’t feel like it as a local…really makes me wonder how people everywhere else are making it.
Visit Nashville and you'll quickly realize the difference.
I'm in a working class New England town. Our median house price is now $620k. You have no idea how good you've got it.
It's al relative. Cities that are more expensive tend to have jobs that offer a chance to make more, all else being equal, but real estate tends to become manifestly more expensive. As far as "how do people make it?" It's a good question. In more expensive locales you can make a decent living, but it may take you longer to reach certain milestones. Longer to move out of the family home, you may need to share a place with a roommate till later, may not have a car for a while, etc.
I lived In Louisville in early 2010s and that was affordable. I lived decently on a graduate student stipend of less than $25k a year.
I was paying $550 for a large one bedroom all utilities included. Everyday essentials were MUCH cheaper
If you're coming from the New England States or California, just about anywhere else in the country is cheaper. We have a saying in New Hampshire. " Make it in Massachusetts, spend it in New Hampshire". Same thing, just a different geographical area.
I vote for Pittsburgh PA to be included on your list. Although the cost of real estate is up, it's still possible to get something more affordable.
Pittsburgh was my first thought.
Thank you for spelling it correctly ❤
It Is on the list
It’s on the list. Watch the video before commenting.
@@k.s.9400 sorry I didn't but he did say to make a guess of what cities made the list before watching. I got sidetracked and never finished watching the video.
You should do a list of the cities with the lowest insurance costs. Some of these “affordable” cities homes are hard to insure!
Ohio.
California
I second that suggestion.
I'm an insurance agent in Wichita. Yeah our insurance prices are high, but property taxes are low. My parents live in the suburbs of Chicago and we compared our escrow accounts. While my homeowners insurance is about double theirs, the taxes they pay are more than my insurance and taxes combined.
OKC has a ridiculous skyline. Why build the one skyscraper that is sooo much taller than the others? It's OKC for God's sake. Not like the skyline is ever going to reach that height again. WTH were they thinking? A bunch of much smaller high-rises as in-fill would have been much more effective at densifying the skyline...which would have made for a much more impressive skyline overall.🙄
I would add Lexington KY, Knoxville TN, Fayetteville AR, Greenville SC, Athens GA, Clarksville TN, Bowling Green KY, Augusta GA
Love the content... Also your Birmingham video is from Birmingham, UK
You should do income per Capita ratio vs cost of living. The kind of application for just cheap living is only good for retired, wealthy or remote workers. You can get even crazier and add crime stats and incarcerations per Capita to find out if you have problems with people vs problems with over policing.
I second this
That's true. A $104k house price doesn't help if you can't get a job for more than $15/hr...
I'll take over policing all day long instead over car-jacking!
@@rgh622 corruption bud. Both will jack your car. TH-cam 'Lehtos law, you were right". Great episode. Cross San Bernardino CA off my list.
@@rgh622 As someone who just moved to Portland, OR .. I feel this. ;\
Your channel is good fun and informative. Love your sense of humour! 🙂
BIRMINGHAM more like 190k to 350k decent areas . Prem areas 600k -$2million
Cincinnati got its name from Quinctius Cincinnatus ( c. 519 - c. 430 BC) was a Roman patrician, statesman, and military leader of the early Roman Republic who became a legendary figure of Roman virtue.
I would flip the order. Cincy, Pittsburgh, Columbus, El Paso at the top, Wichita, Birmingham, Columbia at the bottom. The midwest is just so underrated.
@@AmericanScout-USAAgrée, Indianapolis is very cheap, back in 2015 a 2000 sq ft house was 140-150K dollars, Even now it’s like under 250-300K for a 2000 sq ft house.
A lot of single people can't afford $200+k homes, even if they live and work in an "affordable" city. Even Pittsburgh isn't really affordable anymore for a lot of people. Listings may look cheap, but if you offer asking price you're not getting the house.
Blackrock
Yea, in the county where I live in Texas over half the starter homes last year where bought by wall street private equity firms. It’s almost like they are asking for the pitch forks at this point.
Pittsburgh has surprisingly high property tax relative to the low values of the homes.
lol, you can get a good home for less than $100k that is less than 30 minutes outside of most of these cities. My buddy paid $50k for his and I paid $39k for mine but mine needed about $10k in repairs.
(((Larry Fink)))
thanks Briggs, i appreciate your research
My pleasure!
I've been looking at both the Oklahoma City area as well as the greater Tulsa area, particularly Broken Arrow. I have a friend that lives there. Little things like that matter! 😊
Tulsa is prettier than Oklahoma City but Oklahoma City's bigger...
@@fredingram3731second this. Oklahoma City is “Baby Dallas” where Tulsa has its own vibe.
I'm from Tulsa. Check out Claremore. Look at property taxes. Claremore has some great lakes and people are very friendly.
Hey Briggs, surprisingly, you were in this video.
BTW, Pittsburgh that showed @ #7, is misspelled, you have Pittsburg missing the h. ( 4:55 min mark.)
Was born in Birmingham. The reason the median home price in the city is 104k is because nearly the entire city is slums. What happened to Birmingham is the nicer parts of the city became their own cities. For example the median home price in Mountain Brook is 995k, but that city used to just be a part of Birmingham. Nearly every nice neighborhood/area of Birmingham became its own city(Homewood, Mountain Brook, Vestavia Hills, etc) and what's left is low income neighborhoods and the downtown area.
And we all know why they became separate towns....rhymes with Night Fight
@@JimBrownski I figured that was the case. It is the South after all.
I really like the aerial views! Thank You buddy, water and rivers seem to be a theme, LoL. Stay Safe!
I would like to see you do a video on the states with the best and the worst property tax rates.
Thank you for the website suggestion. My family is selling our house as it’s under threat to be taken by the IRS because we can’t afford the property taxes. It’s entirely paid off, so once it’s sold, we can hopefully keep the money to put toward another place to stay. This video was incredibly helpful and informative, and I thank you for it!
Why would the IRS care about your property taxes? Property taxes are levied by local/state governments.
Total BS. Property taxes are through the state not federal and every state is different. Property taxes on my house and land is equal to one Starbucks coffee a week for a year.
@@jdollar5852 If the IRS is involved, then it sounds more like personal/business income taxes, and the Feds get paid first!
Yea, plus a cut for the big guy.
If your family can't afford the property tax on a paid off house, it's either a super expensive house or your parents are complete bums/have massive medical expenses. Property tax on a really nice house in most states is half the cost of a 1 bedroom apartment.
I did catch you use im assuming is Birmingham UK stock footage at the front end of it! lol 12:48
The video you showed of Birmingham is of Birmingham, United Kingdom. That's Grand Central train station formerly known as Birmingham New Street
Thanks for mentioning Wichita Briggs!! I Appreciate you!!!
Columbus is a great place to live. Lived here for over twenty years best move ever made.
Great video again, I guessed Oklahoma city would be in there, just a note though, at 12:50 that's Birmingham UK 😂😂
Tulsa or northwest Arkansas are pretty good and not extremely overpriced. El Paso suffered from car air pollution from Juarez since they share a valley and cars were often stolen for parts and taken across the border, but that's been several years. The Texas triangle is where the jobs are largely with Waco and Temple being relatively affordable options for remote or hybrid remote workers.
Waco is a dump
Why not Killeen? It is even more cheaper than Waco AND Temple . Crime?
The crime in north Killeen and KISD, except maybe for Harker Heights, keep many away. Though, south Killeen is a good value and has a nice new hike and bike trail and I-14 makes reaching stores easy and Belton/Temple a fairly short trip.
@@bonesandbells yup! Im in Waco , I love Killeen but its sketchy as hell . Beautiful women around and cheap rent. I would choose Harker Heights or Belton due to Killeen's sketchiness
Since you've started showing your face, my idea of what you look like has been shattered! LOL Greetings from southern Maine, love your channel, always informative and fun!
Greetings Briggs, the travel nurse from Baltimore here again... I just wanted to drop a comment because I recently finished an assignment out in Wichita and believe it or not I fell in love with the place! The native Kansans I met couldnt understand why lol but I liked it so much that I renewed my initial 13 week work contract by 8 weeks. I worked/stayed out there from February until just a couple of weeks ago and your description was spot on. Laid back vibe, low cost of living and decent neighbors. The people I met and worked with at one of the hospitals out there were really nice people. While in the midwest I visited Kansas City, hit a rodeo down in Oklahoma City with some friends and also found several places to buy really beautiful Native American jewelry. And did I mention they truly know what to do with barbecue out in the Midwest? The BBQ was pretty good everywhere; only thing I missed from home was decent crab cakes! That was my only complaint about Wichita actually... 😂 Keep it up with the cool videos!
In all fairness, if you are coming from Baltimore, literally ANYWHERE is going to seem nice to you.
@@bbooth1229 You sound like someone who has heard everything negative about Baltimore but didnt grow up here... 🤔
@@brownfoxx76 yeah, that person's comment makes me yearn for a laugh react for TH-cam.
I’m so split on videos like this. On one hand thanks for putting info out to people so they can find better places to live. On the other hand TH-camrs telling the rest of the country the middle of the country is more affordable runs our cost here up.
Mr. Briggs. Great video as always. I was wondering if Albuquerque, New Mexico is a reasonably cheap place to live. I've only been there once but I really liked it. Thanks
Heard the crime is pretty bad
@@andrealmoseley6575 I've heard that the crime rate is high in Albuquerque which is a shame. When I was there, I thought it was a nice city.
Ohhh the man behind every narrations. Great. And I need this vid. Thank you
Why live in Birmingham when you could live in Huntsville and avoid a lot of the crime and poverty?
Cause its stupid expensive in comparison.
@@AaronSmith-kr5yf Huntsville is still a relatively cheap city. Great houses for only 400K, maybe less. West side of Houston is 600K+ now for something good.
@@mjpottertx 400k is pocket money
I will admit I haven’t spent too much in Huntsville but still seems like a growing city. It doesn’t have amenities Birmingham has…..yet.
@@mjpottertxHouses in Huntsville are going for $250/sq ft
I think this is the first time I've seen you say good things about Ohio. Nice. I find myself liking it here.
Yes, and you can tell he was in great pain doing so.
Cincinnati is named after Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus...a Roman statesman who lived between 519 BC And 430 BC. He was a farmer who was drafted into leadership during an invasion that lasted only 16 days. After the victory, he went right back to farming.
Right, why did he do that?
First time I seeing a face to the voice 😊 awesome 👏🏾 keep the great work
One thing I’ve learned from the” first 48” is DONT MOVE TO TULSA they’re ALWAYS ON AN EPISODE OF FIRST 48 every year & every season lmao
I would move to Vinita or Waggoner and drive the 50 miles to Tulsa.
I love Pittsburgh. I've only been there once but it was great. I'd move there if it wasn't so cold and so far inland. I guess I'll just stay in NYC.
Anywhere is better than NYC. I live in the NYC area btw
I moved to just outside Lexington. Rolling hills ,growing economy, decent weather, low crime.
House prices in ButtCrack are low but pollution is an issue 💨 💨
Might be a good idea to give a short course on “sa-it’s-ticks Mean, median , mode, range.
I love your channel, thank you for the wonderful content
I live in Birmingham,al its not as cheap as this video makes it out. It's extremely hard to find a job here that pays a livable wage. A decent house here isn't 100k its more like 250k to 300k plus your wage is low.
Right! More like 350-550k+ for a decent house in a decent location, and there’s nowhere you can rent/live on minimum wage (not even in the bad areas).😪
Idk about that,there are alot of people that live 45 minutes to an hour away and drive to Birmingham for work. Same for Huntsville, there are 40,000 people working on redstone arsenal but alot of them live an hour away from Huntsville and DO NOT want to live in Huntsville.
Remote job
Wooooow first time seeing you. It will take time to adjust 😂. Looking good man. Thanks for your awesome content
I have family that lives in Columbus and nearby in the cornfields. Nice city, plenty to do there, great restaurant/bar scene, good paying jobs. Interesting thing is you can drive 10-15 miles from downtown and be in the sticks, wall to wall corn. Great place to live if you want 3 or 10 acres on the somewhat cheap but still near downtown.
Columbus is nice and was 10 degrees cooler that Birmingham today. But Columbus is nice- fun town to visit. Lots to do. Many free events, pretty nice people, College town vibe. great food and reasonable prices. Highly recommended.
I miss Columbus, when I came back. I wish I had stayed there. I can always move back.
I dig your channel, Briggs. You have a really good format. Very entertaining and informative.
Love your channel.
Thank you
Doc
Army Combat Medic
Of those cities, I do like the look of Pittsburgh but I might chose Cinncinati because of the symphony orchestra Thank you for the video!
Pittsburgh also has a local symphony orchestra that plays at the historic Heinz Hall. A few years back I watched/listened to Yo Yo Ma there.
Columbus, OH used to be affordable. Now it's getting expensive. The real estate market went up more than 300% compared to 5 years ago. with the Intel microchip company coming to Columbus the house that used to be around 100k in the past is worth 400K this day.
Congrats on ONE MILLION subs, Briggs!! 🎉🧡
I have another video idea, do the 10 cities manufacturing jobs leaving China back to the US recently are relocating to. It would be interesting to see if some of the Rust Belt places get revived after this trend.
Large and small Corporations are moving to Mexico and have been for a decade or more. Wayyyy cheaper to transport goods over land as opposed to over seas or aircraft. China has some glaring problems financially..the cracks are showing no matter what the Govt. says. Mexico is prospering in a huge way. Why? They did not and do not print money like most of the world has done AND Mexico's currency is backed by gold and silver. Imagine that...A prospering country backs their currency with precious metals and they prosper immensely. Mexico is the new China.
Manufacturing will never have the kind of jobs like there were back in the early 80s. Because of automation. So you'll get 200 jobs instead of 5,000.
@@kellyname5733 Then why on earth are they all coming here?
@@kellyname5733Americans would be moving to Mexico if it wasn't for the fkn cartels
@debra1363 They don't want to support an economic, manufacturing and military adversary. China is a global threat acting like the old British Empire around the world. They're
Our Enemy. Them and the Russians would like to destroy the Western Civilization.
The see us as an existencial threat
Oklahoma, pass. I need some variety in terrain and a few mountains.
I would be surprised if my current city, Lansing, Michigan is not on the list.
Pretty eye opening. Looking at South Carolina. BTW, still waiting for the ‘Get It, Got it, Good’ T-shirt
El Paso, TX, my hometown! It’s true, El Paso is very affordable and cost of living isn’t so bad. I was able to pay off my home pretty quick, too.
I love El Paso !!!! I see a lot of money being spent there.
I was there for 4 nights 18 months ago for some cheap dental work across the border. I only saw one other white guy the entire time and he was there for dental work also. I made the mistake of going to the Walmart that had the shooting and people were staring at me with fear in their eyes. I went out the entrance only door and set off an alarm. Someone yelled "shoot him". I home things have gotten better as I am headed back for more dental work at the end of the month.
@@optoutsociety8461 I was looking into the dental places in Naco, any opinions or do ya know those ones?
So from your clues on living in SoCal......I know where your from. I worked at HelLax for 27yrs. I'm still here in the South Bay, tons of building, more traffic, and less smoggy days. I really enjoy your videos, and love your sarcasm! Keep up the good works.
For at least two decades, I dreamt of the ultimate road trip - driving a vintage muscle car through the heartland from the Pacific to the Atlantic. Its depressing to see America in 2023 through the lens of many TH-camrs, and I fear that many parts of Canada may not be far behind. Addiction is a cancer.
Avoid big cities. Bam fixed it for ya. I just did another roadtrip from Tennessee (Nashville was rad honestly) and it was epic.
@@thomgt4 I wouldnt travel halfway around the world and miss the chance to see NYC and Chicago, if only for the architecture, but that can happen BEFORE the road trip :D
@@thomgt4 My understanding is that there is quite a bit of addiction in rural/small town areas.
I'd just say that addiction is absolutely avoidable and preventable, I'm not sure about you but I'm tired of the damage and ruined lives in its wake
There is I live in a small town in Georgia with 10k people and there is zombies doped up on everything, its not just in cities like the media wants you to believe, its everywhere, this country needs some serious help@@BlackDoveNYC
Perfect for retirement planning on a budget! These affordable cities are real eye-openers. Thanks for the valuable info!
I live in Birmingham Alabama and my 2 bedroom apartment is $510/month. It's an alright place to live.
I hope you remember to duck for cover…halfway joking.😅😬
Ensly area?
So happy we're seeing so much more of you. Hi, there!
Would be cool in these types of videos to also factor in average rent prices as well
And average utility prices.
Those things should be included in the cost of living numbers.
watching this in mebourne where the median is 920,000 is a crazy experience
Columbia, SC is good for those under 40 with a good income. I moved there from Syracuse NY for a job promotion (also went to Basic Training at Ft. Jackson many years ago). I have since retired and not real happy living here.
I’m from Ky and I say you got the pronunciation spot on. Bravo!
Without knowing what the average salary is in those areas, you can't really determine it's affordability. If you don't make as much a cheaper house is still as relatively expensive.
This is a very underrated reply. THIS is key! If you have to take a 25% pay cut to live in these places, you better make sure that EVERYTHING you buy is 25% less. But 9 times out of 10, it isn't that way.
Greetings I’m a new subscriber living in Vegas from West LA by the Airport so I totally get what your saying. Nice work your doing
Agree with El Paso; did a lot of trucking out of there. On a humorous note, Cincinnati was once named Porkopolis back in the 1800's due to the abundance of swine roaming around. Over the Rhine is fun to visit. Wichita has huge aerospace presence with Cessna and Beechcraft in town.
Great to finally see your face. Love your videos
I've lived in both Wichita and Birmingham, the nos. 1 and 2. I agree with you about Wichita but not so much Birmingham. Wichita is a really underrated place. I had a two-bedroom apartment for $480 a month, and the landlord always said the rent might go up, but it never did in over three years. It was so flat that it was easy to bicycle everywhere in Wichita. I even went to a couple of operas on my bike!
Birmingham is a wonderful place, but I suspect your statistics may be skewed. The reason the median home price is only $100,000 is that there are a lot of neighborhoods where you can't give away houses for free. A lot of houses have been abandoned, sometimes after they're paid off, because the owner couldn't afford to take care of them. Those are neighborhoods where the residents are African Americans. I remember there was an entire apartment complex in one of those areas that was being offered for $10,000! I wonder if they were ever able to sell it. In a more upscale area, a closed apartment complex was offered for $1.6 million. Even though the plumbing had failed, and it would've cost any buyer hundreds of thousands to fix it.
There are nice black neighborhoods where houses are well maintained, but a lot of them are economically depressed. One problem is the city needs a higher minimum wage. The city council tried to raise our minimum wage to $10 a hour a few years ago, and the state refused to let them do it. We now have the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour.
I say Birmingham is a wonderful place because it is quite pretty and wooded, and there are lot of amenities. But I think your real estate price figures are skewed.
Thats not the only reason he is mistaken about Birmingham. It's hot and it's HUMID. Electricity prices can hit 60 cents a kilowatt hour on a hot afternoon thanks to Alabama Power time of use metering. National average is 14 cents. Crime murder drug abuse are common place. Stopping for a red light in Birmingham is likely to get you beat up -really. Don't stop for a red light -no one else will and you, and all the pissed off people behind you, will have to sit and wait at your green light because no one else will stop. Birmingham is a ZOO!
I concur on your assessment about Bham.
Lived in Wichita during 6th-12th grades. It hasn't been the same since Boeing moved most of their engineers out.
@@fecat93 I lived there from 2001 to 2004. I remember Boeing was already starting to cut down their presence a little at that time. What has the loss of engineers done to Wichita?
@@tedgemberling2359 I left in 1989 and my father was required to move by Boeing shortly thereafter. Philadelphia or Hunstville, AL and he chose to retire with on the Space Station project. I wonder if they had a secondary cutdown in the 2000s
Pittsburgh, with a proper urban environment, decent public transport coverage, some level of walkability, okay crime stats and at least some education and tech...
Seems like a wonderful place for affordable living.
The show stopper for Pennsylvania is the high school district taxes. Real estate and school district taxes together may still be less than real estate alone in New Hampshire, but over 3K a year on top of real estate taxes that are already higher than in Virginia when comparing rural areas and similar house values is just a big hit. It might be OK as IRA income isn't taxed in PA, it would depend on your IRA income. We spent several years deciding where to retire, and so many places have surprise taxes that don't make most lists, you have to dig to find out the real cost to live in many states, towns, or counties.
I like your presentation and your videos are really cool. I never make comments, so for me to say anything is special. Keep up the great work.
Guessing Colorado's only contender would be Pueblo. We'll see!
Pueblo west. Shhhh don’t tell but it’s the best place I ever lived.
I live in Pueblo and I like it.
Thankyou. I love your videos.
10. Columbus, OH
9. Cincinnati, OH
8. Louisville, KY
7. Pittsburg, PA
6. Columbia, SC
5. El Paso, TX
4. Oklahoma City, OK
3. Tulsa, OK
2. Wichita, KS
1. Birmingham, AL
Columbus home rices are thru the roof,this must be a old clip.
No way Pittsburgh is
Not all heroes wear capes
Tornados
I live in Covington, KY right across the bridge from Cincinnati. I’d move here over Cincinnati. House prices are better and they’re nicer. Plus, if you wanna go downtown, it’s a 5 minute drive to downtown Cincinnati!