Cost of living in Chicago?

OU812

My friend has been shortlisted for a move to chicago with his company for a three year placement. The company will sort out his visa & are offering him $120k a year. This is almost three times what he's earning here (€40k), but is it a reasonable amount to live in a nice place in Chicago?

He'd be bringing his wife and three young kids, sh presumably wouldn't be working for a while & then would look for something part time & they'd need to run two cars (unlit public transport for him would be good).

They'd probably be looking at a house rather than an apartment so the kids would have a garden to play in.

Anyone give any insight I can pass on?

athtrasna

Personally I'd be looking way beyond Chicago for somewhere to live, there are some fantastic towns in Illinois with great train connections yet amazing communities. I have friends in Crystal Lake, Fox River Grove and Cary and would move to one of those before I'd move to the city. Salary would go a long way out there.

OU812

Any idea of commuting times athtrasna?

athtrasna

OU812 wrote: »

Any idea of commuting times athtrasna?

40 minutes or thereabouts. Iirc Cary is the furthest of those from the city so may be closer to 50.

OU812

That's perfectly acceptable. Thanks, I'll pass it on.

Wompa1

I considered Chicago when moving over. Not sure what industry your friend is in but I'm in IT. Chicago still has many jobs to offer but has fallen off in the last few years. I have a few colleagues who live there...one has resorted to taking contracting gigs and commuting each week. He stays in AirBnB each week and has done for the last 2 years.

Have another friend who's company in Chicago laid off a bunch of people and put him into a different part of the org and he started covering the entire midwest and southwest regions rather than staying local.

Know another guy that didn't have his contract renewed after just moving over 9 months ago from the UK.

The state of Illinois is in a bad way economically. As somebody who moved from Ireland to the US, I would suggest your friend be cautious. I was making about the same as your friend in a cheaper part of the country..with the cost of moving, rental cars for the first while, buying a car, furnishing a place etc. I was broke for the first few months. I didn't start making money until I was in the country for about 9 months.

Is the job full time?...if it is, your friend can expect to work crazy hours for that $120k a year. Don't expect a work life balance. If he's contracting make sure the insurance coverage is good and affordable for the whole family. Also try to make sure his wife gets something more permanent than his contract position...last thing they want is for him to be let go or not extended and be left without insurance. Once he earns 84k+ the family is not eligible for the Affordable Care Act plans any more. The cost of insurance without employer contributions for a family could be 1,500+ a month.

Anyways, good luck!

DM addict

OU812 wrote: »

He'd be bringing his wife and three young kids, sh presumably wouldn't be working for a while & then would look for something part time & they'd need to run two cars (unlit public transport for him would be good).

They'd probably be looking at a house rather than an apartment so the kids would have a garden to play in.

Anyone give any insight I can pass on?

Depending on the visa, she might not be able to work - they should check that out in case it's a deal-breaker.

I don't know anything about cost of living in Chicago, I'm afraid. I will say that a six-figure salary seems to go less far than you'd think if you're living centrally in a big city.

boreder

Wompa1 wrote: »

Is the job full time?...if it is, your friend can expect to work crazy hours for that $120k a year. Don't expect a work life balance.

Difficult to say unless you know specifically about the company and / or department.

I read all that before I moved over too, and it couldn't be further from the reality. At least where I am (Bay Area), the company I work for, and most of those my friends work for, are proactively trying to encourage better work->life management.

Wompa1

boreder wrote: »

Difficult to say unless you know specifically about the company and / or department.

I read all that before I moved over too, and it couldn't be further from the reality. At least where I am (Bay Area), the company I work for, and most of those my friends work for, are proactively trying to encourage better work->life management.

I'm onto my 6th job in the US but I'm not a developer, so maybe devs have things a bit handier. Having said that the devs in my last job worked dogs hours too...we were all expected to one weekend a month but during the time I was there, most of us worked every weekend. That company was based out of Seattle.

I did work for a California based company, they were the closest to normal...but I was still called to work at 3am a few of times for an issue at an anchor customer and or working until 1-2am...interestingly, I have found contract gigs through companies in CA in a cheaper state are the way to go.

It's cheaper to live in other states tax and cost of living wise (I worked out of CA for about 6 weeks, traffic was awful and everything was expensive) and they do things a little different. PTO for contractors, decent health insurance, time in lieu or overtime...but still, worked long crappy hours. Weather was nice though!