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- Sharing a 2 bedroom apartment is, not surprisingly, financially smarter than getting a 1 bedroom apartment by yourself, especially right out of school.<\/li>\n
- In terms of price savings when sharing a 2 bedroom apartment over getting a 1 bedroom apartment by yourself, Miami had the highest median price saving (38.89%)<\/strong>, Boston ranked second (38.20%)<\/strong>, New York City ranked third (37.97%)<\/strong>, Chicago ranked fourth (37.00%)<\/strong>, while Los Angeles ranked last (32.56%)<\/strong>.<\/li>\n
- Chicago was the most affordable city in terms of both the 1 bedroom median price ($1,285)<\/strong> and the 2 bedroom median price per tenant ($793.25)<\/strong> of the selected five cities.<\/li>\n
- For New York City, the borough with the highest price savings when sharing a 2 bedroom apartment was Brooklyn. The top five biggest price savings for zip codes were all located in Brooklyn.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
\nGo directly to a city or section: Boston<\/a> | Chicago<\/a> | Los Angeles<\/a> | Miami<\/a> | New York City<\/a> | Comparison by City<\/a><\/p>\n
\nHow Much Should You Spend on Rent?<\/h2>\n
There is a rule that says you shouldn\u2019t be spending more than 30% of your income on rent. Another way to look at it is that your annual household income should be 40 times the monthly rent to afford the apartment. This is a great rule to follow, as people who are looking to rent apartments, specifically in big cities, have probably come across the very common requirement of making 40 times the monthly rent. While we know many make the decision to bunk up with roommates instead of renting an entire apartment for yourself for financial reasons, the dream for most of us is to have an entire apartment for ourselves! But is that a reasonable dream fresh out of school? That could depend on the job and the area.<\/p>\n
1 Bedroom vs 2 Bedroom Apartment Based on Your Salary<\/h2>\n
Like we just mentioned, it’s financially smarter to get a roommate to split the rent with than paying the full rent yourself. In bigger cities, the rent is usually higher, which leaves you with either getting a roommate or getting a really, really tiny studio apartment that could also qualify as a closet<\/em>. By choosing to share a 2 bedroom apartment instead of getting a 1 bedroom by yourself, you can easily save a significant amount of money on rent. While having an apartment by yourself is the ultimate dream, it might not be the most reasonable dream, especially if you’re fresh out of college. We took a closer look at exactly how much you can save by choosing to live with a roommate instead of getting your own place. <\/p>\n
\nInteractive Maps Show Where You Can Afford to Live Based on Your Job and Income<\/h3>\n
<\/p>\n
The interactive maps below show the costs of a 1 bedroom and a 2 bedroom apartment in Boston<\/a>, Chicago<\/a>, Los Angeles<\/a>, Miami<\/a>, and New York City<\/a>. Furthermore, the maps show the median rent per zip code for the 1 bedroom apartment map and the median rent per tenant for the 2 bedroom apartment map. We used our own rental data to calculate the median asking rent and multiplied that by 40 to calculate the customary income requirement to rent an apartment. When comparing the median rent with the required income, this is what we found.<\/p>\n
- Chicago was the most affordable city in terms of both the 1 bedroom median price ($1,285)<\/strong> and the 2 bedroom median price per tenant ($793.25)<\/strong> of the selected five cities.<\/li>\n
