How Expensive Is It To Live In Alaska?

Alaska is beautiful as you can see from every reality TV show that's out there and from the nearly two million tourists a year who come here it is absolutely breathtaking now one question I get quite a bit from a lot of folks that do come up here and kind of experience Alaska is can I afford to live here you know is this is something that I can do so by the end of this video I'm going to really break it down for you and show you this is something that you can actually make happen for yourself if it's something that you want to make happen before we get started make sure that you give this video a like make sure that you subscribe to my channel to receive more information like like this that's gonna be helpful for you and make sure that you hit the we'll bail over there because that's gonna give you notifications about whenever I create a video like this that's gonna be useful for you okay now let's get down to business I'm gonna break this down into four sections for us to talk about we're going to talk about the income in Alaska just in general we're going to be talking about the expenses we're gonna be talking about the affordability of housing and we're going to talk about special factors that impact that Alaska market the first thing I'm going to say is that Anchorage is going to have a disproportionate impact of what happens to the rest of the the Alaska economy the reason for that is that well over about 40% of its state's population lives in the municipality of Anchorage okay so that's that's a pretty big lying share of what's gonna be happening in in Alaska as a whole so that's something really to keep in mind here so when I use a lot of references to Anchorage it's not at the sand bag anyone or or cut anyone out it's just that's where the majority of lion's share of the state's gonna do and as Anchorage does that's usually a pretty good indication of what's going on in the rest of the state now let's go ahead and dive into this the average income for property for for people who are living in Anchorage is actually just over seven four thousand dollars okay so that's that's obviously thing kind of pretty pretty high for a median now the average for the United States income is going to be just under sixty two thousand dollars obviously it's gonna really depend on on your industry and what it is that you're doing when you get up here if you are a engineer you're obviously going to be making a little bit more than you know if you are let's say serving tables or you know substitute teaching or any other job that I used to do so that's that's something that we really need to look at so you are going to be making more in Alaska now I will also say when you're looking at Anchorage it's actually higher because in Anchorage the average income is actually a little over eighty one thousand dollars okay so $74,000 the entire state Anchorage specifically $81,000 on average so doing pretty good now let's have a look at topic number two the expenses obviously expenses are going to be higher up here because it does cost more to actually transport things here and that's that's obviously going to be a big factor into any consumer good so I'm gonna give you just kind of a a basic idea for how much you can expect to spend over here okay milk a lot of people use this is kind of a gauge to kind of give a fuel for the area milk is just under $4 per gallon okay so let's keep that in mind I am a single guy I do eat a lot though because I'm trying to try to put on put on more muscle and typically I mean between my grocery bill and eating out I will spend about 250 a month on food so that should give you kind of a good idea for what you can what you can expect them to spend on some of those common expenses okay so typically Alaska and Anchorage specifically is gonna be a lot more affordable than a lot of other than a lot of other really expensive stacie to think about and so I mean like York a lot of places in California pretty much it was like anywhere over over in the North East Honolulu all those are gonna be more expensive than than Anchorage in Alaska and the other thing I really want to point out Alaska really has become a lot more affordable in recent years then it wasn't passed right now we are sitting at roughly 27% above the national average as far as cost of living so in other words how much are there were those expenses however a couple decades ago we were actually sitting at about 41 percent above the average was so we are actually becoming more affordable as we move along here which is great now how is the housing situation and what are the special economic factors that impact Alaska and Anchorage in general I'll get to that in just a minute but if you found this information useful please give me a thumbs up subscribe and also make sure that if you have any questions that you want answered by in Alaska and that's actually here and it lives here year-round I would like to I would like to add then make sure you post those comments down below any questions you might have and be more than happy to give you a no-holds-barred 100% truthful answer for any questions you might have how are we doing on housing you know the big thing that I'd like to point out to people we actually have a drop and a number of new homes up here that are being built and a lot of the homes that are being built is actually not in Anchorage but actually in the mat-su Valley it's about probably about 30 30 minutes to an hour away from way from Anchorage further up north this is a really interesting kind of development because about 50% of the new homes that are being built in the state are being built in the mat-su Valley whereas only 14% of the population actually live there so that's that's still good because it's close enough to Anchorage to where you can you can work in Anchorage where wages are going to be higher typically depends on your industry right but you can work in Anchorage live in the mat-su valley where them the cost of the houses are gonna be a little lower so that's that's good news now I will also say though that there are not a whole lot of new houses being built and Anchorage's as a matter of fact the number of homes that are being built is the lowest since 1989 so that's something really to keep in mind now let's talk about the affordability of the houses prices have remained pretty pretty consistent the recession didn't really have that big event big an impact on it this is actually one of the few places in the United States where the recession has actually made housing and homes in this area more affordable than it was before the recession so that's it's actually doing pretty good the average price for homes in Anchorage is actually right around 372 372 thousand dollars is the average average price for homes to sell in Anchorage so that's it's actually doing pretty good and the recession didn't really hurt us all that much now what if you're looking at renting well the average rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Anchorage is going to be roughly about $900 if you're looking for a two-bedroom it's gonna be closer at about $1,100 obviously a lot of factors that go into this are you looking for some kind of a beautiful high-rise or are you just looking for something to get by are you well looking for a pool and a bunch of other things or just the bare bones here obviously a lot gets clumped into that but that's just kind of give you an idea what are some of the special factors you know that impact mostly just the mostly just the Alaska market not really the rest of the United States well there are a number of big ones okay first off I'm gonna say we're garlis what the rest of the United States economy is doing Alaska is going to benefit I'll explain so if it's doing really well like it's doing right now the economy's clipping along a lot of people are employed we're doing well and what that does is it spurs tourism okay our tourism industry in Alaska is huge like I said we had just shy of 2 million tourists come through the state last year for a state population that's roughly about seven hundred and thirty-two thousand having nearly 2 million people go through obviously is a pretty big deal okay that's gonna definitely do a bit of a Kickstarter for our economy here so that's good now let's say that the rest of the United States economy starts tanking okay so what does that do for us well a couple things number one are our tourism obviously takes a hit because people don't have as much money to go out and explore and go on vacations but what it does do is it does create kind of a pull factor as historically any time that people have moved to Alaska it has been during a time of economic downturn where people are trying to find more opportunities and so they're willing built further and further north and a little bit more off the off the beaten path to find an opportunity so like a sin or garlis how the US economy is doing Alaska stands to benefit now another factor that impacts Alaska and not the rest of the United States is what is called the Permanent Fund dividend what this is is it is essentially a bank account that the state of Alaska created when we started and it says that all the proceeds that come from you know the oil and any of it money from them any of the exploration and oil they have further up north that actually goes back to some of the proceeds of that will go back to the citizens of the state because in the constitution of the state the citizens actually own the resources of the state so as a result of that you actually will get a check every year from the state per person in your household this past year was roughly about $1,600 per person now if you have a family of 10 kids that's that's gonna be a sizable chunk of change now it's interesting to see how this impacts the area okay some people will take that and it's just extra spending money and we're just gonna go buy whatever other people are really strategic and how they use it obviously it's gonna be up to you to decide however you use it if you do want to qualify for this though you got to actually live up here whole year pay so no snowbirds it can't just come up here for the summertime and then you know run out as yes so those the winter hits you have to live here and then do so for it's at least a year so that's definitely a factor that's impacting the market here that doesn't really impact the rest of the United States Oh finally another factor that impacts the Anchorage in the Alaska market in general is oil okay and energy Alaska is an energy economy a lot of what we do is going to be kind of centered around what the oil prices are doing okay and how much oil we can produce further up north if we have a bunch of industries that are built around supporting this this energy sector in our economy you can see how it becomes such a big deal so those are going to be some of the those are going to be the big factors to impact the local market if you have any other questions make sure that you comment down below or contact me directly I'd be more than happy to answer any questions for you

Channel: Alaska Realtor

Views: 76,110

Keywords: GoeckerGroup, how expensive is it to live in alaska, anchorage, alaska, anchorage alaska, lifeinalaska, costoflivinginalaska, alaskaliving, alaskanliving, cost of living in alaska, why do people live in alaska, living in alaska, Keller Williams, Keller Williams Realty, Keller Williams Realty Alaska Group, real estate, realtor, alaska realtor, moving to alaska, life in alaska, road trippin, Alaska realtor

Id: K4bc3j74BiA

Length: 13min 19sec (799 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 25 2020