This salary calculator does not compute...
May 12, 2010 11:47 AM Subscribe
How reliable are the online calculators to determine salary adjustments when moving from one cost-of-living area to another?
(Asked anon so my co-workers don't realize I've decided to move away and find new work).
I work in IT and have 19 years of experience, living in a semi-rural area. I want to move to a bigger market where there are more opportunities for advancement and hopefully work for a much larger company than I do now. For those reasons as well as some personal reasons, I'd like to move to the greater Chicagoland area.
I've started a job search for careers that I'm qualified for, but to determine what my salary should be so I can maintain my current lifestyle, I went to this cost of living calculator and entered my current salary and city, and chose the Chicago suburb of Orland Park for the comparison.
I was stunned when the calculator said I would need to make $148,000 in Orland Park (a 56% salary increase).
In looking, I am not finding any jobs with a listed salary of about $150k per year (or $75/hr). The most I'm seeing is closer to $120k.
So my question is--is this calculator right, or is there something else that needs to be taken into account?
And I suppose as a follow up, for someone with 20 years experience in IT, is $150k an achievable salary in the Chicago area?
If more info is needed I have the throwaway chicagosalaryq@gmail.com
(Asked anon so my co-workers don't realize I've decided to move away and find new work).
I work in IT and have 19 years of experience, living in a semi-rural area. I want to move to a bigger market where there are more opportunities for advancement and hopefully work for a much larger company than I do now. For those reasons as well as some personal reasons, I'd like to move to the greater Chicagoland area.
I've started a job search for careers that I'm qualified for, but to determine what my salary should be so I can maintain my current lifestyle, I went to this cost of living calculator and entered my current salary and city, and chose the Chicago suburb of Orland Park for the comparison.
I was stunned when the calculator said I would need to make $148,000 in Orland Park (a 56% salary increase).
In looking, I am not finding any jobs with a listed salary of about $150k per year (or $75/hr). The most I'm seeing is closer to $120k.
So my question is--is this calculator right, or is there something else that needs to be taken into account?
And I suppose as a follow up, for someone with 20 years experience in IT, is $150k an achievable salary in the Chicago area?
If more info is needed I have the throwaway chicagosalaryq@gmail.com
I fairly recently moved from Houston to San Francisco.
If I wanted to keep the same gorgeous spacious apartment in a central part of town and keep my car, I would have had to triple my salary. By downgrading to a studio and taking up public transportation, I managed to make a fairly lateral move budget-wise.
People move to the suburbs to get access to better real estate prices or schools. If these things are of lesser import to you, you should be fine.
posted by politikitty at 12:02 PM on May 12, 2010
If I wanted to keep the same gorgeous spacious apartment in a central part of town and keep my car, I would have had to triple my salary. By downgrading to a studio and taking up public transportation, I managed to make a fairly lateral move budget-wise.
People move to the suburbs to get access to better real estate prices or schools. If these things are of lesser import to you, you should be fine.
posted by politikitty at 12:02 PM on May 12, 2010
Salary calculators are kind of crap, IMHO. If you're moving to SF, a single-family home in most areas will run you a million dollars and up. Does that mean the cost of living is 5x [rural place] where a house goes for $200k? No, it means you'll probably rent an apartment or buy a condo. On the other hand, you'll have access to jobs where you might (with low but higher-than-most-other-places probability) become wealthy in an IPO. If that happens then the $1m house will be less of a burden than the $200k house you left. Change some variables around and you'll see Chicago involves different kinds of tradeoffs in the lifestyle you'll live.
tl;dr: It's complicated. Cost of living is multidimensional and you care about your own personal situation and not the average that the calculator spits out.
posted by jewzilla at 12:35 PM on May 12, 2010
tl;dr: It's complicated. Cost of living is multidimensional and you care about your own personal situation and not the average that the calculator spits out.
posted by jewzilla at 12:35 PM on May 12, 2010
Given the uncertainty about real estate valuation, I'd look VERY skeptically at those calculators and cost-of-living estimates right now.
I think a lot of the relocation calculators are pretty explicitly taking into account property values. Housing is expensive in major metropolitan areas; that's part of what makes smaller cities so attractive. Don't forget the transaction cost of selling your current house (if you own); is it possible for you to do so without taking a huge hit?
The Chicago area real estate market is in a pretty interesting state of flux right now (although whether it's better or worse than other areas is up for debate). If you are not afraid to sink your money into real estate, there are potential "deals" to be had (both in the condo market and in the suburbs). Anecdotally, there are also "motivated seller/landlords" who are dropping their prices on rental houses in the suburbs. OTOH, it's possible that real estate prices could crash further.
posted by QuantumMeruit at 12:37 PM on May 12, 2010
I think a lot of the relocation calculators are pretty explicitly taking into account property values. Housing is expensive in major metropolitan areas; that's part of what makes smaller cities so attractive. Don't forget the transaction cost of selling your current house (if you own); is it possible for you to do so without taking a huge hit?
The Chicago area real estate market is in a pretty interesting state of flux right now (although whether it's better or worse than other areas is up for debate). If you are not afraid to sink your money into real estate, there are potential "deals" to be had (both in the condo market and in the suburbs). Anecdotally, there are also "motivated seller/landlords" who are dropping their prices on rental houses in the suburbs. OTOH, it's possible that real estate prices could crash further.
posted by QuantumMeruit at 12:37 PM on May 12, 2010
You don't have to live in Orland Park. Chicagoland is a really, really big place. You can easily find a house at virtually any price, somewhere in the city or suburbs. It just depends on the trade-offs you are willing to make regarding being near your job, having a lot of space, how nice your house is, etc.
That's just one aspect of cost of living.
posted by mai at 2:11 PM on May 12, 2010
That's just one aspect of cost of living.
posted by mai at 2:11 PM on May 12, 2010
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by COD at 11:58 AM on May 12, 2010