San Francisco vs Austin Cost of Living

How does Austin compare to San Francisco with cost of living? Having moved from San Francisco ourselves, we have been noticing the differences as we go out and shop, but wanted to put some real numbers to it. So, we headed over to our favorite cost of living comparison website, BestPlaces.net.

First a bit about the two cities:

San Francisco Cost of Living

• 2010 Population: 787,686
• Population Growth Since 2000: 1.31%
• Median Home Price: $676,660
• Compared to US Average, San Francisco’s cost of living is 105.8% higher
• Unemployment rate: 9.75% (Nat’l Avg 10.20%)
• Job Growth: -5.75% (Negative)

Austin Cost of Living

• 2010 Population: 750,367
• Population Growth Since 2000: 14.35%
• Median Austin Home Price: $222,450
• Compared to U.S. Average, Austin’s cost of living is 6.20% higher
• Unemployment rate: 6.50% (Nat’l Avg 10.20%)
• Job Growth: +0.17% (Positive)

Three interesting points of difference between Austin and San Francisco are job growth, unemployment rate and population growth. Austin’s unemployment rate is about 3% less than San Francisco and the job growth is positive whereas San Francisco’s is negative. And, with the 14.35% population growth in Austin compared to 1.31% growth in San Francisco, it looks like Austin is poised for recovery. With companies like Facebook and Google opening up offices in Austin, will Austin be the next tech capital? Will be interesting to see.

San Francisco vs Austin Cost of Living

How does San Francisco compare to Austin as far as cost of living is concerned?

Overall: Austin is 48% cheaper than San Francisco

The major difference in Austin vs San Francisco Cost of Living is …. Housing.

Austin is 67% cheaper than San Francisco with Housing.

And, we can say from experience in both Austin and San Francisco area real estate, you get a lot more for your money in Austin.

San Francisco vs Austin Salary

If you make $50,000 in San Francisco, you can live the same lifestyle in Austin if you make $25,802 in Austin.

If you make $100,000 in San Francisco, you can live the same lifestyle in Austin if you make $51,603.

As a general rule of thumb, you can live the same lifestyle in Austin for half the salary as you would have to make in San Francisco. Since salaries are not 50% less in Austin, this means more money in your pocket!

How Do Other Cost of Living Indexes Compare?

In the chart below, 100 is considered the national average. As you can see, Austin comes in lower than the national average in a lot of categories. The two categories Austin is higher than the national average is housing and miscellaneous expenses (which include clothing, restaurants, repairs, entertainment and other services).

San Francisco, on the other hand, is higher than the national average in every category except for utilities. Housing is what really increases the cost of living in San Francisco.

The above data is from BestPlaces.net.

Relocating to Austin from San Francisco?

You’re making an excellent choice! How do we know? Because we’ve done it! Austin is a great place to live and you’ll find most of the people who currently live in Austin have relocated from other parts of the country – many of them from San Francisco – so you won’t be the one person who isn’t from Austin.

Need Help Finding a Place to Live in Austin?

When we decided to move to Austin, it was pretty difficult to find quality information about Austin neighborhoods. We vowed to make that process much easier for our clients and have spent the last several months compiling our Austin Neighborhood Guide. Check it out and tell us what you think.

Need a little personalized guidance? Email us at info@AustinRealEstateHomesBlog.com or call us at (512) 827-8323 and if you tell us what you’re looking for in a neighborhood, we can point you towards the neighborhoods that would best meet your search criteria and save you time.