Soliciting your help - moving to the US (?)

[Cyrrex]

I mentioned in another thread (Useless Conversation) that my family and I are considering a move back to the US.  Well, this is getting much closer to being a reality, seeing as how I have actually been over for a round of interviews.   They are now in the process of putting together an offer, so it won't be too long before I have to make a firm decision one way or the other.   What is covered by the contract is rather complicated and not worth getting into...for the sake of this post, the only important thing to mention is that literally all my expenses related to the physical move are covered.  Additionally, housing is not going to be an issue either, as the company provides a pretty generous rental allowance.

All other concerns aside, what looks to be the main factor in my decision is going to be how much my actual take-home pay is going to be, and whether it is enough to live comfortably on.   This is where you, random intraweb monkey, come in.  I am looking to solicit your well-meaning advice in an effort to gather as much information and opinion on the matter as I can.  I'll not hold anyone accountable for anything that turns out later to be less than fantastic advice.

A few facts:
- We are a family of four.  My wife and myself, two kids aged 1.5 and 4.5.  For various reasons, my wife would not be working, at least not initially.
- We would be living in the suburbs north of Chicago (say, at least 20 miles north).  The area, as I understand it, has a cost-of-living that is generally higher than average.
- Again, house rental is a non-issue
- I would receive a basic utilities allowance (for water, heat, electricity, A/C) of around $400 per month...is that enough?
- More than likely, I will not have to take any car loans.  I hope to be able to pay cash for whatever vehicles we get.  Would have to pay car insurance, however.
- I would need to pay for cable/internet/phone expenses myself
- It seems likely that I may rent things like furniture (to supplement our own stuff, not to furnish a whole house), and potentially certain home entertainment items.

First of all, if you have any interesting advice on any of the above points, feel free.  More importantly, and the whole point of this post:  taking the above into account, after all these kinds of fixed expenses are paid, what do I need to have left at the end of the month to live in relative comfort and have a cushion to fall back on? 

Both real-life accounts and wild guesses welcome.

[Cyrrex]

oops...can I get a mod to move this to General Discussion?  Thanks.

[Trippy]

I know nothing about the cost of living in Chicago but based on what I know about the San Francisco Bay Area I would say you could get by with $3000 month take home pay (i.e. after taxes). I also know nothing about the costs of raising children so I could be way off.

Because your rent is taken care of your biggest single monthly expense will be for food which could get expensive depending on how well you like to eat (I can easily blow $200 a week at Whole Foods just for myself). Next biggest will probably be your car and renters insurance. I don't know how badly the car insurance companies will "stick it to you" for having been away for awhile since you don't presumably have a long history with any of them so it might be expensive. $400 a month for water/gas/electricity may not quite be enough, especially come winter time but you shouldn't have to pay too much "out of pocket".

So a very rough breakdown might be (per month):

$1000 food
$500 insurance/extra utilties
$500 clothing/necessities
$1000 savings/other

[Big Gulp]

I know nothing about the cost of living in Chicago but based on what I know about the San Francisco Bay Area I would say you could get by with $3000 month take home pay (i.e. after taxes).

With rent already covered???  You've been in San Francisco too long. 

Okay, a month's food will run around $1000 for a family of four, so he's pretty much nailed that.  You said you're gonna outright buy whatever vehicles you're getting (I figure two cars), that amounts to about $100 a month (appr. $50 a car) if you go with PLPD, since I figure whatever you buy won't be an ultra-luxury vehicle.  Cable with internet will run around $100 a month also if you go for the complete package; movie channels, etc.

Gas and electric will run differently, but figure around $100 a month for either depending on whether it's summer or winter (electric will cost more in the summer, gas in the winter) so we'll call those utilities $150 a month combined.  Since you'll be renting (and have it paid for) you won't have property taxes to pay, which is nice.  So I'd say for absolute necessities you'll need to cough up around $1350 a month to cover the basics.  Everything over that is savings/mad money.

If this sounds cheap, remember that Trippy is thinking in California money (not a very good measure for the rest of the country).  You also said your were looking at the suburbs of Chicago, which depending on how far out you are prices could be different but the biggest price fluctuation will be in housing, which apparently isn't a factor here.  There's just no comparing the coasts (particularly California) to the midwest or the south in cost of living.  It's night and day (or sane vs. insane depending on your point of view).

[Cyrrex]

Even if I cannot use San Fran as an index, the info is still helpful...for example, the question on car insurance is quite relevant because I do not know if an American insurance agency will readily accept my Danish driving history (it worked the other way around, but it was a struggle).  Renters insurance is a point as well, particularly because I haven't a clue how much that can run.  All other insurances are probably not going to be an issue.  What is PLPD?

Food budget is difficult to predict.  Local and national averages for a family of four run around $600 per month, but I have a feeling we could easily exceed that.  It is generally understood that persons on this type of assignment spend far more on these kinds of things than their local peers...but if nothing else, it is something you can control if you need to.  The thing is, I don't WANT to have to control it, so I would tend to want a large food budget.  I mean fuck - I nearly ejaculated in my pants going to Burger King while I was there.  You probably can't imagine the appeal until you are away from it for several years.  Damn, I am going to get really fat.

Thanks for the input.

[schild]

I have a 3,000 square foot house. Renters insurance with 4 bachelors is $400 a year for a nice payout. I don't think I'd worry about renter's insurance unless you're in a scary place. Like Crenshaw.

You gonna shop at Walmart, Safeway/Krogers/Regular Supermarket, or Trader Joes? That makes a huge difference in your budget. 4 kids? The wife cook? Get a Costco and Sam's Membership stat.

[Cyrrex]

We'd get a house around that size, give or take, and definitely in what would be considered an upscale area...above average wealth, low crime and where the only drive-by shootings are made by rich dudes trying to hit a seven iron from a moving golf cart.  So I guess renter's insurance won't be a big deal (I've never had it, so I had no clue).

2 kids, not 4.  Shopping at random supermarkets, but I am not the Trader Joe's type.  More of a concern is becoming a weak, gluttonous pig than actually purchasing gourmet stuff.

[Trippy]

Gas and electric will run differently, but figure around $100 a month for either depending on whether it's summer or winter (electric will cost more in the summer, gas in the winter) so we'll call those utilities $150 a month combined.  Since you'll be renting (and have it paid for) you won't have property taxes to pay, which is nice.  So I'd say for absolute necessities you'll need to cough up around $1350 a month to cover the basics.  Everything over that is savings/mad money.

My PG&E (gas and electric) bill for September was $200. That's for one person living in a moderately sized house. Granted I have many computers in my room, one of which is on 24/7 but there you go. Water here is ridiculously cheap (it's subsidized) but would be very expensive given how many plants I have to water every week. And this is California, with no AC running at all in September (though the house does have central AC). Chicago in the summer? Chicago in the winter? A lot more energy usage I would imagine. It could, however, be a lot cheaper in Chicago given how fucked up California's energy situation is.

[Big Gulp]

Chicago in the summer? Chicago in the winter? A lot more energy usage I would imagine. It could, however, be a lot cheaper in Chicago given how fucked up California's energy situation is.

I'm in Michigan (on the outskirts of Ann Arbor, also an expensive town), so it's pretty much the same situation for me as Chicago would be.  I've got a ranch house, 3 bedrooms, and in summer with the AC always on I pay around $100 in electricity.  Of course, half the day everything (but AC) is off because I'm not home, but I'm not at all energy conscious so I take my bill as a decent baseline for a reasonable (not extravagant) home.  Winter is a little bit more expensive since that's when my gas bill really takes off (all my appliances are electric, so in the summer my gas bill is essentially just what I pay for having the hookups).

As to PLPD, Cyr, that's basic insurance for a vehicle if you own it outright or bought it through a signature loan.  It amounts to basic coverage (ie, medical expenses).  The insurance company will cover most of the damage you might do to another vehicle, but for your own vehicle's damage it comes out of your pocket.  If you're going the "buy a used (but decent) hooptie" route that's what I'd get.  I figure that I pay $300 every 6 months through Progressive for coverage slightly above PLPD, so that should be a reasonable estimate for ya.  My driving record isn't great, but it isn't horrible either.  I figure I'm average there.

[Cyrrex]

Okay, I figured it was something like that...I could reason out that PL meant personal liability or something, but PD...best I could come up with was personal disaster.  Disability?  Whatever, doesn't matter.  Insurance quotes I have seen on the kind of cars I would be looking at go around 50 bucks or less each...but that is assuming they will accept my driving history.

Indices for San Francisco versus the area I expect to be living give SF a score of about 142, versus about 111 (100 being national average) for utilities.  But I'd expect my expenses to be higher than average anyway, what with the wife at home.

[Merusk]

This might help you a bit.  Just be sure to include the rental fee in your 'take home' pay.

I used to know a website where you could get the cost break-down for common goods like Milk, Gas, Cereal, etc but I can't remember how I searched it out last year.  Here in the Cincinnati area for a family of 4, we have enough to stock away about $200 a month, pay our housing and utilities and feed ourselves with a household income in the $60k range.   We should have about $500 per month more, but there's a consolodation loan we're paying off.  The house is a 2-story 3 bedroom in a mid-middle class neighborhood I got a deal on because I worked for the company that built it,  so we're only paying $950 a month.  I can't quote utilities directly atm because they go to the wife's e-mail.  We do budget billing, though and that costs us $200 a month for a gas heater, with all else electric.

www.chicagogasprices.com vs www.detroitgasprices.com says you'll be paying a little bit more for gas than he's budgeting.  Of course gas milage and drive distance and traffic all make a huge impact on your budget.  Chicago has really really bad traffic, so you'll burn a lot on the road if you have to drive.  They do have a decent train system, though, so you can save yourself there so long as you don't need the independence of a personal vehicle during business hours.

Gulp's assessment on insurance gels with my own experience, but I imagine you'll have to fight to get them to consider your foreign driving record.  If they don't I'd guess you'll be paying as much as a first-time driver, which in my case was about double what I'm paying now.  (Still $650 a year but it was for one car I only drove part-time)

Hope this helps a bit.

[Big Gulp]

but that is assuming they will accept my driving history.

It's a competitive market for insurance so I wouldn't sweat it all that much.

[Cyrrex]

This might help you a bit.  Just be sure to include the rental fee in your 'take home' pay.

I used to know a website where you could get the cost break-down for common goods like Milk, Gas, Cereal, etc but I can't remember how I searched it out last year.  Here in the Cincinnati area for a family of 4, we have enough to stock away about $200 a month, pay our housing and utilities and feed ourselves with a household income in the $60k range.   We should have about $500 per month more, but there's a consolodation loan we're paying off.  The house is a 2-story 3 bedroom in a mid-middle class neighborhood I got a deal on because I worked for the company that built it,  so we're only paying $950 a month.  I can't quote utilities directly atm because they go to the wife's e-mail.  We do budget billing, though and that costs us $200 a month for a gas heater, with all else electric.

www.chicagogasprices.com vs www.detroitgasprices.com says you'll be paying a little bit more for gas than he's budgeting.  Of course gas milage and drive distance and traffic all make a huge impact on your budget.  Chicago has really really bad traffic, so you'll burn a lot on the road if you have to drive.  They do have a decent train system, though, so you can save yourself there so long as you don't need the independence of a personal vehicle during business hours.

Gulp's assessment on insurance gels with my own experience, but I imagine you'll have to fight to get them to consider your foreign driving record.  If they don't I'd guess you'll be paying as much as a first-time driver, which in my case was about double what I'm paying now.  (Still $650 a year but it was for one car I only drove part-time)

Hope this helps a bit.

Yeah, I've been to Homefair, but it is of dubious value to me...the nature of the contract being worked up is such that it isn't possible to compare things across the board, least of all the actual salary.  If I added up all of the numbers and posted the actual figures of what my total salary would be in theory, you'd think I was a total assclown for even asking for advice.  There are certain deductions, allowances and tax issues (both positive and negative), over which I have no control, that cloud things up enough that total salary is meaningless.  At the end of the day, I will know that I have X dollars leftover after these things (I don't know the actual amount yet), and a general idea of what I need to apply that to (Y).  I want to make sure that X exceeds Y enough that the whole thing seems worth it.

The rest of your post though...good stuff.

[Strazos]

Fucking NJ....~$1200/6 months from Geico, though I do have a little comprehensive and health coverage in the plan.

[Signe]

Righ had no problem with his British license either with getting a new license or getting insurance.  We pay around $600 every six months for the two of us,  but we get all the bells and whistles.  If we were to go with the state minimum, it would be less than $200 for six months.  Don't fret though, Strazos... I think much of it might be your age.

I'm sort of sorry we moved, though.  I miss my house, my friends, my car and pretty much every thing else.  (except the taxes and petrol prices)  I can't wait til we move back to either England or spend more time in another part of Europe, even though my family is here.  Nothing good has happened to me since we moved to the US and I'm beginning to become superstitious about it.  It's a nice place to visit, but I don't want to live here!   :-(

Anyway, the biggest bill we seem to have, besides rent and credit cards, is electric.  Evidently, you have to be careful.  Unknown to us at the start, the company we rent from has some sort of dodgy scheme going with an electric reseller and we can't switch companies.  Righ couldn't find a thing about it online and finally had to go outside and check the stamp on the meter to figure it out where to find the reseller.  It's diabolical.  I've compared my bill to my sister's bill,  we're in the same county, and ours is significantly higher.  We live in a rather ginormous townhome and they're going to murder us this winter, I'm sure, even though heat and cooking is gas.  The silly woman at the leasing office, who also lives here, told us her bills run about $300 a month which included everything.  She either lied or lives in someone's garage.

[CmdrSlack]

Car insurance in Chicago is going to be higher than car insurance in the burbs.  It seems to matter to local agents whether you drive your car for "recreation" or "commuting."  My advice is to take Metra or the CTA to work (if you work downtown or anywhere in the city, really).  Do this at least once a week.  Then, you can not be entirely lying (and thus not committing insurance fraud) when you tell your insurance company that you drive mainly for "recreation."  That and a suburban address will make your prices pretty damn reasonable.  Also, check into Country Companies for insurance if you're not in Cook County.  I have no idea if they're still around, but all through high school and college, I had insurance via them.  It was glorious.  They make you join the Illinois Farm Association or something like that, but you get a great discount on the price of insurance compared to other places. 

As far as actually commuting goes, I take the train everywhere unless I"m running late, then I drive.  Granted, I live in the city, so I take the CTA all over the place -- and the busses run on a nice schedule here.  In the suburbs, the Pace busses suck ass, but the Metra trains themselves are pretty nice.  Also, you can drink on the Metra if you so choose.  This can help make the Metra ride that much more fun.

If you're concerned about public schools, I know that suburbs like Wilmette and Glencoe have good schools for the North Shore suburbs.  Further west, no idea, but my cousin has grown up in the Buffalo Grove school system her entire life and seems relatively smart for a 14 year old.  EDIT -- The suburban schools are all pretty good, but the more expensive the area, probably the better the schools.  Heck, your oldest kid is just barely kindergarten age anyway. 

I highly advise doing everything in your power to avoid having phone service from SBC.  They are the phone company out here, and they're utter cockmongers.  I personally have a cable modem and Vonage largely because of the bad experiences that I've had with SBC. 

My bills have been very high as of late (for gas and electric), but the building where we currently live (and hopefully not for much longer) apparently is wired/plumbed so that our electrical covers the basement apartment and common areas, and our gas line also feeds the communal washer dryer and water heater area.  You will not have to worry about this in the areas where you want to live. 

Looking at last month's bills, gas was at $0.61/therm and power was $0.08 per kilowatt hour.  You'll have the same gas and power companies, so hopefully that can give you an idea of what stuff'll cost.  Maybe not, because I have no idea whether they bill utilities that way where you currently are.  At any rate, expect to eat it hard if you heat  your place via gas this winter. 

[Merusk]

Anyway, the biggest bill we seem to have, besides rent and credit cards, is electric.  Evidently, you have to be careful.  Unknown to us at the start, the company we rent from has some sort of dodgy scheme going with an electric reseller and we can't switch companies.  Righ couldn't find a thing about it online and finally had to go outside and check the stamp on the meter to figure it out where to find the reseller.  It's diabolical.  I've compared my bill to my sister's bill,  we're in the same county, and ours is significantly higher.  We live in a rather ginormous townhome and they're going to murder us this winter, I'm sure, even though heat and cooking is gas.  The silly woman at the leasing office, who also lives here, told us her bills run about $300 a month which included everything.  She either lied or lives in someone's garage.

What's your kW usage compared to your sister's?  Is there a shared laundry or common area with lights? The wife and I had a really high bill at an old multi-family townhome we lived at and we couldn't discern why.  Through my own investigation of the wiring and which meter it ran into I came to discover someone had hooked-up a set of Washer/ Dryer outlets in the basement that were linked into our meter.  I disconnected it and watched our electric bill drop pretty significantly.

[shiznitz]

On thing not mentioned is schooling. I assume the public schools where you will be living are good but there are public school systems that one would think are good based on geography that actually are not. Plus, the 1.5 year old will be eligible for pre-school next year. Pre-school can easily be $3k+ a year. Public school in the US doesn't kick in until kindergarten (5 yrs old +/- 6 months). If the public schools are sub-optimal, private day school is $15-20k easily.

[Morfiend]

One thing I want to mention. I have a friend who lives in the suburbs of Chicago. He is desperatly trying to move out. I guess they recently demolished one or the major projects in Chicago, and moved all the people to low cost housing in the burbs. This has made the area my friend lives in a total nightmare. Crime rate is up by about 750%, every car and house in his neighborhood has been broken in to multiple times, and where he used to leave his doors unlocked at night, he now sleeps with a gun taped behind his headbord.

Just a word of caution. Make sure you check out the area they are moving you to before you go.

[Signe]

We live in a large townhouse, we have our own laundry, no shared lighting or anything.  We went by the kw price when we compared.  It really is a bit of a scam between the company who own the complex and the reseller.  We did finally find some stuff about them online and it seems that the more full the complex is, the better the price.  Unfortunately, this is a rather new area of very large townhomes and there is still quite a few not rented... and they're still building.  If you own your own home, you have a choice of provider.  Most people get their gas and electric from the same provider here, as it saves money. 

[RhyssaFireheart]

Cyrrex, if you can, it would really help to know what suburbs you're looking at.  North of Chicago can mean many different things and covers a fairly wide range of city types.  Heading north along the lakeshore can be much more expensive than heading northwest along I-90.

I honestly couldn't give you any living $ figures at this time, my husband handles paying all the bills and most of them are online.  Unlike Slack, I have had absolutely no problems with SBC providing phone and DSL service, but I'm not in the city either.  I live about 45 miles NW in Lake in the Hills.  It's convenient to the station in Crystal Lake though, and my commute downtown is just over an hour on the express when I do have to go there.  If the trains weren't running for some reason, I'd work from home.  I refuse to drive downtown, since it would take me at least 1.5 hours to do so if I'm lucky. 

I'll ask the husband for some basics on utilities, see what he gives me.

[Cyrrex]

Thank you all for the feedback.

I should probably make it clear that when I said "at least 20 miles north of Chicago", I meant it very literally.  Home would be, say, no further south than Buffalo Grove or Northbrook....going as far north as Libertyville (which seems a popular place to live for people in my situation) or as far west as Vernon Hills (which seems to have a lot of nice housing available).  So we are talking quite a ways away from the urban sprawl and into what I perceive as the upper scale areas.  And at the risk of coming off as a bit of a dick, I would generally refuse to live in any place that doesn't meet a certain standard in terms of comfort and safety. 

My commute would be within that same area.  Public transport won't be a realistic option.

Signe - did Righ have to re-test for his license, or did they simply convert it straight over?  Your read on the cost of insurance is about what I had expected...two cars with medium levels of coverage around 480 for 6 months, all assuming they accept my history, but from what I'm hearng in this thread I am more hopeful than I was.

[Engels]

Having personally been witnes the commute to and from Chicago in a north/south direction, I suggest getting a prescription for Valium as soon as you get stateside.

[Signe]

You keep your foreign license, at least Righ did.  He simply had to take an eye test and a written test.  (well, it's on a machine really)  No driving test at all.  I'm sure that varies from state to state, though.  The written test was so easy that he didn't even read the booklet and easily passed.  Of course, he'd been driving with his British license for some time, anyway.

Now, I had an PA license that had been expired something like 8 or 10 years and when we moved back, I went to DMV and they issued me a new one.  All I had to do was pay... no eye exam, no test, nothing.  Just a photo and a cheque.

[RhyssaFireheart]

  No driving test at all.  I'm sure that varies from state to state, though. 

He's moving to Illinois, and in particular, the Chicago metro area.  We've made giving away licenses an art.  Plus, I'm fairly certain that Cyrrex can't drive any worse than most of the idiots in this city.

There's a reason I let my husband do most of the driving while I sleep/doze in the car.   

[Cyrrex]

Having personally been witnes the commute to and from Chicago in a north/south direction, I suggest getting a prescription for Valium as soon as you get stateside.

Do you mean the actual metropolitan area?  I'll never get anywhere close to the actual city limits in my commute...from what little I saw of it on my visit, it didn't look too bad.  I guess I need a larger sample, though, and naturally it would depend a lot on where I was actually living in relation to the office.

I did years of a commuting in Seattle, and well, I can't imagine anything more horrible than that stinking 520 (Mercer Island) bridge and every route leading to and from it.  I'm sure it gets worse than that, but I haven't experienced it personally.

[Engels]

Do you mean the actual metropolitan area?  I'll never get anywhere close to the actual city limits in my commute...from what little I saw of it on my visit, it didn't look too bad.  I guess I need a larger sample, though, and naturally it would depend a lot on where I was actually living in relation to the office.

I did years of a commuting in Seattle, and well, I can't imagine anything more horrible than that stinking 520 (Mercer Island) bridge and every route leading to and from it.  I'm sure it gets worse than that, but I haven't experienced it personally.

I meant from the north suburbs towards the city. I've lived in Seattle for 13 years now, and I have taken 520 about 12 times; that's how much I hate it. I know your pain. That said, the Chicago commute was worse. If you're not driving direcly into Chicago, it probably won't be that bad, but then again, have you tried driving around Puyallup during rush hour? Who knew the sticks could be such a mess?!

Moral of the story is; get a car you don't mind sitting in. Good strereo, with newfangled mp3 player built-in a plus.