Agricultural Calif. city almost as expensive as SF, report says

The largely working class city of Salinas, California, is the seventh most expensive U.S. city to live in, according to a new U.S. News & World Report list.

The list places Salinas just behind San Francisco, which sits in sixth place, and ahead of New York City, ranked 11th.

The U.S. News & World Report list ranked the cities by comparing “how comfortably the average resident of each metro area can afford to live within their means.” The calculation involves weighing income against housing costs for renters and homeowners. 

While the actual cost of living in Salinas may be significantly lower than in San Francisco, the gulfs between average annual income, median home price and median monthly rent are comparable. The median home in Salinas costs $925,458, which dwarfs the city’s average salary of $56,350. In San Francisco, meanwhile, the median home costs $1,122,946 and the average salary is $86,590, according to the report.

California cities took seven of the top 10 spots on the list, with San Diego and Los Angeles ranking most and second most expensive, respectively. The Bay Area city of Santa Rosa ranked eighth on the list.

Salinas lies at the mouth of California’s Salinas Valley, which is nicknamed the “Salad Bowl of the World,” and many residents work in the agriculture industry. Whether the U.S. News list refers to Salinas, the city, or the entire Salinas metro area, which includes the well-heeled oceanside communities of Monterey and Carmel-by-the-Sea, is unclear in the report, but locals say the cost of living in the city is high. 

Joaquin Turner, who commutes from Salinas to Carmel-by-the-Sea, where he runs a gallery, told SFGATE that the rents in Salinas are currently “really high.” U.S. News pegged the city’s median monthly rent at $1,718.

“We think of Salinas as being more affordable,” he said, “but if you look at it compared to the rest of the U.S., or even other parts of California, Salinas is still quite pricey.”

SFGATE has reached out to U.S. News for clarification on the report, but did not receive a respond in time for publication.

This story has been updated.