COST OF LIVING IN DALLAS
Before we get started, let’s establish a few things. When people who live outside of Dallas generally talk about Dallas, they’re talking about the entire area around Dallas that encompasses the suburbs around Dallas and Fort Worth. You’ll hear it referred to as DFW or the Metroplex. And sometimes the DFW Metroplex.
Alright, now we’ve established that, let’s start with housing prices. This is one of the things that makes it so attractive to live in Texas. For August 2021, the median price for our entire MLS in Dallas Fort Worth was $337,308. When you look at other markets in Texas, the median home prices in Q2 2021 were $307,200 for the Houston area and $515,100 for the Austin area.
Outside of Texas, the Median home price for Q2 2021 was $756,000 for LA, $348,600 for the city of Chicago and $536,700 for the New York/Jersey City area.
So that’s owning a house, what about renting?
According to RENTCafé the average rent for an apartment in Dallas is $1,338 per month. The average rent in Houston is $1,172/month and the average rent in Austin is $1,539 per month.
Outside of Texas the average rent is $2,450 for LA, $2,012 for Chicago, and for Manhattan it’s a whopping $3,872/month.
If you decide to rent a home that’s not an apartment in Dallas County, here are the year-to-date averages for September 6, 2021.
A one-bedroom home will cost you about $1,247/month.
A two-bedroom home will cost you about $1,830/month.
A three-bedroom home will cost you about $2,524/month.
A four-bedroom home average $3,063/month in rent.
So that talks about getting into a home, whether you’re going to buy it or rent it.
Now lets talk average cost for all the other stuff.
Homeowners Insurance.
Agh. You’ve gotta have it and Texas is on the high side. The average cost of homeowners insurance for $250,000 dwelling coverage is $1,863.
Your energy bill is going to average about $175/month. But the good news is that Texas is deregulated. This simply means that consumers have options and can compare rates and services for the third-party supplier portion of the electricity bill.
A gallon of gas currently costs $2.65. It’s currently September 2021. If you’re watching this much later, put a comment below asking about an update and I’ll get you that information.
If you like going to restaurants to eat. Dallas has a ton of options. If you want something nice but not necessarily upper scale, you can expect to pay $20-$30 for an entree, drinks will run you about $12-$15 a piece and appetizers around $10-$15.
Our grocery prices are 1 point below the national average.
You can also see here that we’re in a good place when it comes to our positioning with the rest of the country when it comes to healthcare and we are below the national average.
Property taxes. I did a whole video about property taxes in Texas. We have high property taxes in Texas and depending on where you are in the metroplex, the tax rate can vary. It’s going to range mostly from 2% to 3%. We have PIDs, MUDs, and PUDs and you should definitely watch that video about Taxes in Texas get more information. Overall, Texas ranks as one of the highest for property tax rates. For a home in the City of Dallas that isn’t in a special tax district, the current rate is 2.71%.
That’s property taxes, and then there’s our state income tax. Just kidding. WE DON’T HAVE ONE! So yeah, our property taxes are high but you don’t pay a state income tax.
Now what about commuting? The average one-way commute in DFW takes a little over 28.7 minutes.
The median household income for the DFW Metroplex is $72,265.