[steveBK123]

NYC housing quality is, absolutely, dollar for dollar, garbage value. With or without discounting car costs.

My (now) wife & I both got well paying jobs at banks out of college almost 20 years ago. Our entire signing bonuses went to apartment fees & deposits. We were each in a situation where 1 paycheck per month went to the rent. Neither of us had a dishwasher, let alone a washer/dryer, central air, any aircon.. etc. Our buildings had bugs&rats, and walls thin enough to hear neighbors phone calls.

Marrying and moving up to nicer places, we still had no washer/dryer across the next 2 apartments.

Finally when we felt like we had "made it" in our mid-30s, we bought a new condo and finally have a washer/dryer. It cost more than my parents, in-laws, and sister's homes combined.. and then multiplied by two. It has only 2 beds (not 3 like the aforementioned homes). My kitchen has a stove the size of a fisher price play kit, and the oven doesn't fit standard sized baking trays. I have only 1 zone AC which can't manage to keep the different rooms within +/-5F of each other.

I could live like a proverbial king in 95% of the rest of the country on this budget.

[moneycantbuy]

so why then do you continue living in NYC if the quality of life is relatively worse? i bounced from a similar situation in sf to a lower cost of living area and am loving it, albeit i have the luxury of working remotely.

[steveBK123]

I spend ~50% of my time outside NYC now as I am remote.