The most overpriced cities? Seattle is near the top

The most overpriced cities? Seattle is near the top
Apr 1, 2015, 7:45am PDT

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BUSINESS JOURNAL | Karen Ducey

Seattle is No. 16 on a list of the most overpriced cities in the U.S.

Emily ParkhurstDigital Managing Editor-Puget Sound Business JournalEmail | Twitter | LinkedIn | Google+

If you’ve looked closely at your grocery bill lately, you may have noticed that the cost-of-living in the Seattle area is fairly high.

Well now Forbes has crunched the numbers in its annual study of the most overpriced cities in the U.S. The Seattle-Bellevue-Everett area ranks No. 16.

The city’s median income is fairly high: $86,027. But housing is affordable for only 51.2 percent of families.

While the city’s utility bills are 4.1 percent less than average, Seattle residents are paying more for nearly everything else. Health care is almost 19 percent more expensive here than average, and transportation is nearly 10 percent higher. Grocery bills are about 6 percent more expensive.

Compare that to Southern Connecticut, which was No. 2 on the list. There, median income is $83,700 and about 51 percent of families have affordable housing. There, however, utilities are nearly 33 percent more expensive than average, transportation is 19 percent more expensive and grocery bills are more than 15 percent higher.

No. 1 on the list, rather unsurprisingly, is Honolulu, Hawaii. Again, median income is about the same: $82,600. But expenses are staggeringly high. Utilities are 78 percent higher than average, groceries are 55 percent more expensive. The views are lovely, but only 35 percent of Honolulu families have affordable housing.