The Cost of Living in St. George: A Real Breakdown

St. George is not the bargain it was a decade ago, but it is not California either. Here is an honest look at what it costs to live here.

Housing does the damage

Housing is where St. George runs high, call it roughly 20 percent above the national average, with a median home price in the mid-$500s and rentals that stay tight because so many people keep moving in. Coming from a big coastal city, it will feel like a deal; from the Midwest or the South, it will feel steep. Housing is the number that decides whether St. George is affordable for you.

Where you save, where you pay

Utilities actually run a little below the national average most of the year, except summer, when running the AC from June through September can push power bills to $200 to $300 a month. Groceries, gas, and the rest land close to average. Overall, the cost of living sits somewhere around 5 to 9 percent above the U.S. baseline, with housing doing almost all of the lifting.

The offsetting stuff

A couple of things soften it. Property taxes are low for owner-occupants thanks to the primary-residence exemption, there is no state estate tax, and the median household income here is in the low $70,000s. It is not a cheap place, but for what you get, the weather, the outdoors, the safety, a lot of people find it a fair trade.

Budget honestly for housing and summer power, and the rest tends to fall into place.