Top 10 CHEAPEST Cities to Live in America for 2020

[Music] what's the most important factor for you when deciding where to live some might say the jobs nature nightlife family friendliness or even food but the number one answer for most people is affordability now i know the holiday season always presents some great deals but the cost of living in the following cities might actually be the best deal out there yes today we're going to be talking about the cheapest cities to live in the united states and yes none of them are in california now the criteria we used for this list was based solely on living expenses you know everything from housing costs to utilities groceries health insurance child care taxes etc and to qualify as a city for this list a place has to have a population of at least a hundred thousand residents so keep that in mind before you comment why is it middle of nowhere town in oklahoma population 2000 on this list you could buy a home there for 20k oh and if you want to see a video on the 10 best cities to live and save money in that you'd actually want to move to let's hit 5 000 likes but without further ado these are the top 10 cheapest u.s cities to live in for 2020 [Music] number 10 buffalo new york wait what new york is like the most expensive place to live how to city there make this list well first of all new york is only the fifth most expensive state to live in and that's only because most of the people here live in the new york city metro where yes prices are crazy expensive pretty much all of upstate however is insanely cheap and buffalo is probably the cheapest of the bunch i mean you could literally buy a four bedroom house here with a mortgage payment that's cheaper than rent for a 400 square foot studio in manhattan but of course new york taxes still apply which are some of the worst in the country the combined sales tax rate is 8.75 income tax ranges from 6.2 to 6.85 for most residents and the effective property tax rate is a staggering 2.64 but when you take into account that the median home value is just a hundred and sixteen thousand dollars that number doesn't seem so bad and if you're not looking to buy the median rent is just eight hundred and twenty eight dollars a month sure wages aren't as high here as they are in new york city but the median household income of around 60 thousand dollars isn't terrible considering the cheap cost of living and all there is to do there's tons of fun museums restaurants bars and professional sports and niagara falls is just 20 minutes away although that also means you're only 20 minutes from canada so as i'm sure you can guess it gets cold temperatures regularly drop well below freezing and there's nearly a hundred inches of snow here every year number 9 memphis tennessee the birthplace of rock and roll might be cheap but you should probably still roll on through instead of living here well unless the type of rock you're looking for is a rock breaking your car window when someone robs you yeah there's a reason memphis is so cheap it's one of the most dangerous u.s cities of any size with an overall crime rate 223 above the national average a violent crime rate 401 percent above the national average and a murder rate that's 484 percent above the national average it's no wonder why no one wants to live here even with an incredibly low median home value of just 105 000 all that crime makes sense though when you consider the poverty rate of 26.8 percent and median household income of just 54 000 and the situation isn't getting any better since the economy sucks and the public schools are even worse which is probably due to a lack of funding since tennessee doesn't have any state income tax but hey at least you're saving a few thousand bucks each year now if potentially being mugged stabbed or shot doesn't scare you memphis actually has a ton of cool things to do it's a rich multicultural city full of history entertainment and amazing food number eight peoria illinois pura what wait so you're telling me there's another city in illinois i thought it was just chicago and a bunch of farmland okay dude seriously you're gonna have to chill out and yeah i guess there are no other big cities in illinois both around 360 000 people living in the metro area peoria isn't tiny either situated along the illinois river towards the center of the state peoria has got a cute downtown and unlike chicago is incredibly inexpensive but ironically that all comes with a price while the median household income of sixty thousand dollars might seem pretty good when you consider the median home value of just eighty nine thousand dollars in median rent of 732 bucks a month the city and state of illinois in general also have some insanely high taxes and despite the effective property tax rate of 2.27 percent the combined sales tax rate of 10 and income tax being a flat rate of 4.95 the city's infrastructure still sucks with tons of potholes horrible schools and a lack of renovation over the years that has left the city looking old and dilapidated without even an attempt to fix things this of course has led to many people fleeing the city and crime emerging with a violent crime rate 175 above the national average but the worst part about living in peoria is the weather from the heavy winter and snow to tornado warnings to huge temperature swings incredibly windy days flooding dreary autumns and hot and humid summers the climate as a whole here just isn't pleasant number seven brownsville texas yeehaw our first texas city and there definitely could be a few more considering how affordable most of the state is located at the very southern tip of texas right on the mexican border brownsville is home to splendid subtropical weather and close to the beautiful beaches of south padre island but while that might seem perfect for eight to nine months out of the year it also means it gets way too hot and humid way too often not to mention the occasional hurricane besides the unpleasant summertime climate however browns feels great it offers some of the best tex-mex in america the art scene is thriving and there is so much mexican and indigenous culture in fact for a city of just 183 000 people there's a surprising amount of amenities like museums historic sites a zoo restaurants and parks but the best part of all is how insanely cheap it is with the median home value of just a hundred two thousand dollars a median rent of seven hundred and eighty seven and no state income tax it's practically free paradise groceries are also 12 below the national average and a gallon of gas is just a dollar 74. whoa so you're telling me brownsville is cheap and a good place to live there has to be a catch well there is the median household income is only 41 000 and 31 percent of residents still live below the poverty line despite the very low cost of living surprisingly though this hasn't led to much crime is brownsville's one of the safest cities in the us i guess warm weather really does make people nicer number six detroit michigan you didn't really think we could make it cheapest cities list without talking about detroit did you how is it only number six though you might wonder considering that the median home value is just forty three thousand dollars and still nobody wants to live here well for starters that number's a bit deceptive since many of the cheap homes in detroit are abandoned and uninhabitable while the homes people would actually want to live in are closer to 200 or 300k and while there are some cheaper areas the violent crime rate that's 428 above the national average and murder rate that's 728 above the national average are not worth the risk and no matter where you live you'll be paying a lot for damage done to your car since the roads here may just be the worst in the nation seriously i know someone that blew a tire within two miles of leaving the airport now downtown has undergone huge renovations and is actually turning into a hip fun and safe place to be in detroit's metro area actually has some really nice suburbs like bloomfield hills or birmingham but there is a huge wealth gap between those affluent areas and the majority of the city which still looks like this detroit's actually the most impoverished u.s city with a poverty rate of 36 percent number five cleveland ohio similar to detroit cleveland's another industrial midwest city whose heyday is far behind it which is a shame really since it once was a thriving boom town but since the city's economy has never recovered from so many jobs being shipped overseas more and more residents continue to leave every year this lack of demand has made it one of the cheapest cities to live in with a median home value of just 75 000 and a median rent of 813 bucks a month although even with those low housing costs tons of people are still struggling the poverty rate of 34.6 percent is actually the second highest of any city but at least things are probably only gonna get cheaper since i'd assumed the amount of people who are dying to live in a place with a violent crime rate 281 percent higher than the national average is rather small honestly even if you're just visiting i'd be super careful with which neighborhoods you drive through because you definitely don't want to break down in the wrong part of town which is probably more likely than you think due to all the enormous potholes but it's no surprise i mean the weather here is gloomy as heck if you thought portland was bad cleveland's saying hold my beer cause it gets over 300 cloudy days a year and pretty much everyone's depressed from november to march oh and unlike portland or seattle it actually gets really cold here with nearly 60 inches of annual snow number four akron ohio wait what another ohio city yep and it certainly won't be the last poor ohio is home to so many cities that were once great places to live but as jobs continue to move out people continue to move out resulting in an extremely affordable cost of living which brings us to akron now predictably crime rates are still high but at only 137 percent above the national average it's a lot safer than cleveland and cleveland still only 45 minutes away if you want to catch a game concert or other big city amenity unfortunately though being so close also means the weather is still dreadful with 300 cloudy days and 158 rainy days each year and while the average house here is a little more expensive than in cleveland with a median home value of eighty one thousand dollars the cost of pretty much everything else is cheaper with the median rent being just eight hundred and three dollars and utilities grocery bills child care costs health insurance and even the average cost of a wedding being lower as well oh and for the first time on this list the public schools here are actually decent number three birmingham alabama wow what a big surprise the largest city in our worst state to live in for 2020 just so happens to be one of the cheapest cities now almost every city in alabama is dirt cheap but birmingham is dirt cheap the median home value is just 73 000 and the effective property tax rate is only 0.66 average utility bills are also 15 below the national average and child care costs are some of the cheapest in the nation at under six thousand dollars a year of course though there's a reason things are so cheap well multiple reasons actually for starters many of the super affordable houses are also falling apart not to mention the neighborhoods they're in are incredibly dangerous as birmingham's violent crime rate is 404 percent above the national average and the murder rate is 736 above the national average but all that crime didn't come out of nowhere the 27.2 poverty rate and huge disparity of wealth are likely to thank for that because while the median household income of the entire metro area including the nicer suburban areas is 58 000 the median household income within the city limits is only 31 grand number two date in ohio honestly at least like five or six different ohio cities could have easily made this list but that still doesn't change the fact that basically nobody wants to live in them now it might seem strange that despite all of these cheap cities ohio didn't even make our top 10 cheapest states video but that just goes to show the huge division of wealth the state suffers from while cities like columbus and the affluent suburbs are thriving cities like dayton aren't so lucky downtown is practically a ghost town no like even before covet and most of the office buildings are 80 percent empty of course the lack of businesses also means a lack of jobs which certainly doesn't help the poverty rate of 32 percent in fact within the dayton city limits the median household income is just 28 000 so while the median home cost of 68 000 and median rent of just 791 bucks a month may seem very cheap they obviously aren't cheap enough now before we get to number one make sure you leave a like and subscribe and let me know what video you want to see next also i wanted to give a quick honorable mention to a place that just barely missed the 100k population criteria flint michigan remember how flint was in the news for all those neurotoxins and lead in the water well that was six years ago and the water is still toxic and so is the entire living environment not only is the water causing permanent damage to the residents so is the corrupt government terrible school system pothole ridden roads and violent crime rate 255 percent above the national average added no good jobs and a poverty rate of 40.4 percent and it's no wonder that drug problems are rampant here sure you could buy a house for less than the price of your average car with the median home costing just 31 000 but it'll probably look like this and while the groceries utilities and health insurance costs are all less than the national average don't forget to budget for a lot of bottled water number one jackson mississippi would you look at that the number one cheapest city to live in just so happens to be the capital of our number one cheapest state and while mississippi definitely isn't winning any best state awards anytime soon it's also not the worst and boy oh boy is jackson cheap the median home costs just 47 000 and the average utility bills groceries and overall cost of living are all around 10 percent cheaper than the national average but is it really worth it when half of the houses on your street are abandoned or burned and the roads have potholes the size of yoga balls the murder rate's also 830 percent above the national average and besides murder there just doesn't seem to be much going on unless you count obesity and teen pregnancy now i honestly don't think anyone ever willingly moves to jackson but if you're intrigued it is the cheapest city to live in the united states for 2020.

Channel: From Here to There

Views: 120,539

Rating: 4.8554215 out of 5

Keywords: cheapest state, cheapest cities to live in, Top 10, best cities to live in, where to live in america, cheapest cities, worst states in america, cheapest states to live in, best states, worst cities to live in, california, us cities, best states to live in, america, worst states, buffalo, new york, memphis, tennessee, chicago, texas, detroit, cleveland, ohio, mississippi, alabama, cheapest places to live, geography, best cities, usa, Travel, best cities in the us, best places to retire, oregon

Id: wAYdF_dsgUg

Length: 15min 51sec (951 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 16 2020