The conventional wisdom is that it's cheaper to live in the outer suburbs (i.e., a long drive from jobs, stores, or schools) than closer to a town or city center. I suppose that's true enough -- if you're looking only at the cost of housing.
But if you live a long way from most of the places you want to go, you wind up driving a lot more. And that, of course, costs money too -- not just for gas, but also for depreciation on your car, maintenance and the like.
Which leads to the obvious question: what happens if you combine transportation costs and housing costs into a single budget? Is living at the urban fringe still cheaper?
There have already been a couple of attempts (see, e.g., here) to look this issue. Now there's a new study, noted here in The Washington Post. The key finding: when you combine travel and housing, living in a suburban outpost can cost more than living closer to a town or city center. According to the study's author:
Even if you save a couple of hundred dollars a month on your mortgage, it doesn't nearly outweigh the costs of the cars you are driving.
Obviously, the more money you spend on your car, the more you're sinking into a depreciating asset. Buy a house and a decade later it's worth more than you paid for it (provided you didn't buy at the top of a bubble). Buy a car and a few years later you've got a bunch of gas receipts and a car that's worth just a fraction of what you paid for it.
Which means that shifting your spending from your car to your home can be a good way of boosting your long-term finances.
Another point worth noting:
The study found that most people in the outer suburbs pay so much for transportation not just because of long commutes but also because they have to use their cars for nearly every errand and trip.
That seems right to me. When most people think about transportation costs, they think about commuting. But for the typical household, commuting represents a surprisingly small share of total driving. And if you live in the sort of place where every trip -- every errand, social visit, you name it -- requires a car, the miles and the costs can add up quickly.
Now, on the one hand, it seems that a study like this reveals something genuinely new. Many folks who've chosen long commutes to inexpensive houses may just not have done the math, to tally up the cost of all that travel. If they'd really taken the time to consider the savings they might reap if they could drive less -- or even get rid of one of the family cars -- maybe they would have chosen a different place to live.
But on the other hand, not everybody will be swayed by this sort of reasoning. People looking to buy a house in the exurbs aren't just looking for cheaper housing. Lots of people are looking for something else -- a big yard, a sense of privacy or solitude, a school system where they think their kids will be better off, a certain kind of community layout. And they're willing to pay for those things -- perhaps not in housing costs, but certainly in money and time spent on, and in, their cars.
But in the end, there's no inherent reason people can't find good communities, or good, safe schools, or quality open space, or even privacy, in more densely populated places. Those kinds of livable, urban, and dense suburban neighborhoods exist already -- there just aren't enough of them. And that's what makes housing there so expensive: lots of people want to live there, so the demand is high; but there's not much of a supply. So if we do a good job increasing the supply of good neighborhods -- with a high quality of life, and where stores, services and jobs are close by -- then high-quality housing will become more affordable, even as transportation costs fall.
Of course, there is one exception to the we-can-have-it-all fantasy in the preceding paragraph: big yards, fenced off from the public. It seems to me that there's just no way to give everyone a big lawn and a short commute. The math just doesn't work out: big yards just spread everything too far apart, and cars start to become a dire necessity rather than an occasional convenience.
Which leads me to believe that you really can have affordable housing and transportation, great neighborhoods, and great big yards. You just can't have all three at once.
Comments View as Flat
David Roberts Posted 7:29 am
16 Oct 2006
kids
It pains me somewhat, but I agree with what daveatkins said over here:
On that note, my wife and kids and I are moving at the end of the week to a house ... yes, with a big yard. I'm feeling decidedly ambivalent about it -- maybe I'll post on it later this week.www.grist.org
Permalink
gogogreenguy Posted 10:32 am
16 Oct 2006
You can too!
You really can have live in the city with great transportation and have a "big yard" -- it's called a park. And they are all over, usually just a short walk or bike ride away.
Permalink
randino Posted 10:41 am
16 Oct 2006
Cost of suburbia.
The number one reason for moving to suburbia is that our society long ago decided to let our cities become shit holes. Young couples in Cleveland live in the city until the birth of their first child. Then it is adios because among the middle class in the Cleveland area, sending your kids to the Cleveland Public Schools is considered child abuse. You also have to deal with crime. One household of desperadoes can depopulate an entire block. Finally in spite of all the blather about multiculturalism, the fact is that most Americans - especially white Americans - don't want to live around people who are different from them. Boys and girls, can we spell racism?
Randy Cunningham
Randy Cunningham
Permalink
Biodiversivist Posted 11:12 am
16 Oct 2006
If these people would put a dollar value
equivalent to their hourly wage on the time wasted in cars they would find that they are losing a fortune, as well as a big chunk of their lives.
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Help acquire and protect ecological hotspots, give to a conservation organization: www.saveourbiodiversity.com
Permalink
KathyF Posted 5:44 pm
16 Oct 2006
The last time I drove around Chicago
it looked like there were plenty of office buildings located right in the suburbs.
Granted, if you're young and childless, or old and childless, living in the city near theatres, good restaurants, night spots, and other childless couples might be attractive, despite the fact your work may be located in the suburbs.
But when you have children, going to the theatre is not nearly as viable or desirable as going to a soccer game.
Also, for those of you who haven't been to the suburbs lately, there is plenty of shopping available there, more, in fact, than in the city, where dept stores all pulled out in the 90s.
So when are we going to have the study about the high commuting costs of living in the city?
Permalink
Biodiversivist Posted 4:00 am
17 Oct 2006
daveatkins is describing Seattle's
neighborhoods.
Maybe more cities should be emulating Seattle, which has surrounded its (thriving) city core with neighborhoods that are mostly zoned for single family housing, which includes townhouses and mother-in-law spaces. The cost of said housing goes up as you get closer to downtown, but gets more affordable in the more outlying neighborhoods. Many big cities have rotted away at the core and are surrounded by high-rise housing--pressure from developers to jam as much housing as possible into as little space as possible. Seattle has to date, found a good balance.
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Help acquire and protect ecological hotspots, give to a conservation organization: www.saveourbiodiversity.com
Permalink