Cheapest Places to Live in the US: States and Cities

The cheapest state to live in is Arkansas, with prices 13.1% below the US average, then Mississippi and Iowa. Of 384 cities, the cheapest is Monroe, Louisiana, 16.4% below; in Florida, Wildwood-The Villages, 14.6% below. Rank by rent, goods or utilities, or any state’s cities, above.

How to use it

Choose what to rank: the 50 states and DC, every US metro area at once (all 384), or one state’s metro areas (Florida’s are third on the list). Then choose the measure: everything, rent, goods or utilities. For the states, a Census region narrows the list to the Northeast, the Midwest, the South or the West. Tell it where you live to see your state’s place in the list, and tap any place to open the Cost of Living Comparison on your state against it, with the salary you would need there. Copy the link to share the list.

What the ranking measures

Every number is the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis’s Regional Price Parity for 2024, released February 19, 2026: how much the same things cost in a place, with the US average at 100. A state at 87 has prices 13% below the average; one at 110, 10% above. “Everything” is BEA’s all-items figure: “The term “all items” refers to all the detailed consumption goods and services used in the estimation of the RPPs.” Rent is BEA’s housing figure, and BEA is clear about what it covers: “Housing price levels are only estimated for tenant-occupied housing.” Utilities: “Household utilities consist of water supply and sanitation and electricity and gas.”

The regions are the Census Bureau’s four (Census Regions and Divisions of the United States). A metro area is a city and its suburbs, named for its main cities: Wildwood-The Villages is Sumter County, where The Villages retirement community is. A metro area that spans states appears under each of them.

The cheapest cities to live in the US

All 384 metro areas in one list, cheapest first: these are the ten at the top. Louisiana has four of them and Alabama two, and the South holds every one. Wildwood-The Villages, the Florida retirement community, is 9th. Choose “Every US metro area” above for the other 374, or rank them by rent.

The ten most expensive: California has six of them, and Miami is the only one in the South. 295 of the 384 metro areas are at or below the US average, because the big, dear ones hold so many people that they pull the average up.

The cheapest place to live in Florida

The cheapest beach towns to live in

Prices are measured by metro area, so the honest answer is the cheapest metro areas on the coast: 74 of the 384 have a county on the ocean, by the Census Bureau’s list of coastline counties, “those directly adjacent to the Atlantic Ocean, Pacific Ocean, or Gulf of Mexico”. The Gulf of Mexico is the cheap coast: it holds eight of the ten below. On the Atlantic, Brunswick-St. Simons, GA is the cheapest; on the Pacific, Eugene-Springfield, OR, just above the US average. Choose “Beach and coast” above for all 74, and each row names the county that puts it on the shore.

On Florida’s coast (17 metro areas) the cheapest is Homosassa Springs, on the Gulf in Citrus County, then Tallahassee and Gainesville — a capital and a college town that count because Wakulla and Levy counties reach the Gulf. The first with a beach in its name is Crestview-Fort Walton Beach-Destin. Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach is the dearest place on any coast of Florida. A metro area is a county or several, so “on the coast” means some of it is: Gainesville itself is well inland.

The cheapest and dearest state in each region

Worked examples

California to Arkansas. From the dearest state to the cheapest, the same way of life costs 21.5% less: $60,000 in California is about $47,110 in Arkansas. Most of the gap is rent, 62.3% lower.

Miami to The Villages. Within Florida the spread is wider than between most states: 25.2%, so $60,000 in Miami buys what about $44,900 does in Wildwood-The Villages, with rent 66.7% lower.

Where Florida stands. At 103.4, Florida is the 11th most expensive state, and Miami pulls it up: 21 of Florida’s 22 metro areas cost less than Miami, and 13 are at or below the US average.

Common mistakes

• Counting prices and forgetting pay. Cheaper places usually pay less too. Compare the salary you would need with the Cost of Living Comparison before you plan a move on prices alone.
• Reading rent as house prices. BEA’s housing figure is rent. Home prices, mortgages, property taxes and insurance are not in it, and in Florida insurance can change the sum.
• Reading a metro area as a town. The number is for the whole area, suburbs included; a small town inside it can be cheaper or dearer.
• Leaving out taxes. No income tax in Florida or Texas is not in these numbers either.

Plan the move

Read is it cheaper to live in Florida or Arizona?, Florida or California, the east or west coast of Florida, is Ohio a good state to move to? and the best places to live in Texas for families. Then price the trip to go and look with the Road Trip Cost Calculator.