Nutmegger

Plus her daughter, who lives with her, will not be able to come along. And there will be the expense of shipping two dogs over, I gather, and getting up to speed on all the immunizations that are essential for them in the US. In many places, dogs live far less visible lives in the US than they do in the UK, where one sees them out and about on the high street. (And don't forget to look for pet friendly rentals -- even if places do take pets, they will usually want an extra security deposit over and above the usual one.)

mrken30

We also don't know the complete picture of the current OP situation. If they are earning 40k in central London, that is hard, compared to earning $60 in some US cities. Except for the car part, you don't need a car in London.

Peaches1960

We live in Dorset...

hungryhorace

Where out of interest?

Peaches1960

Poole

hungryhorace

I grew up there. I wouldn't leave beautiful Poole for Virginia.

petitefrancaise

Hi,Peaches1960
Look at trulia.com, zillow.com redfin.com for areas where you might consider living, this will give you a good idea of rental costs. Do speak to estate agents and ask about commuting times.

Make out a budget on excel listing all your current living expenses and try to match it with costs in the US. We will all help where we can. The healthcare cost is the one which is going to be tricky to figure out just because it is so company policy dependant. At the end of the day, you don't want to move and not have enough money to live the way you want to so it really does come down to budgeting for everything and seeing if it will work. Some things are cheaper here (petrol) , others more expensive ( car insurance, health insurance) so it kind of works out to be about the same.

Try not to dip into your savings too much for this move - a car is going to be the issue here. If you lease a car, then you will need a downpayment and buying secondhand cars is more expensive than the UK. Look on craigslist.com for fredericksburg to get an idea of costs.

There is a forum that I like which has a funny name but it's full of good ideas for living frugally in the USA - mrmoneymustache.

$65k is livable, you don't have kids' university fees to pay for, get cars that are cheap to buy/run. minimise commute time as much as possible.

And like the others have said try to get an L1 visa for your husband's move then you can work if you want to. Maybe try to get a green card written into the deal too?

Pulaski

Which was why I passed no opinion on the salary, but gave some examples of expenses. .... The result is not much, if any, change out of $50k gross; obviously 60k is better than $50k. Do we live on $50k gross? No, but if we needed to, that is what our budget would look like. I know that some people live on less, but that means some tough decisions, but you know that already.

Pulaski

No need, just put in to-from addresses into Google Maps - the travel times are real-time estimates, so from the UK pick take a look at around 12:30-1:00pm for the morning commute, and around 10:00-10:30pm for the evening commute. .... I would trust Google over an estate agent's guesstimate.
In many respects Virginia is even better than NC. If I had to leave NC it would most likely be to Virginia, much of the state is beautiful.

mrken30

The other big difference is food quality/cost, you can buy reasonable food in the UK for reasonable cost, in the US it tends to be cheap low quality food or expensive high quality food, not much in between. Our food bill is $200 to $300 a month for a family of 4. For instance a 6 pint (UK) / 1 gallon of milk is over $5(£4) here, a loaf of bread is around $5 and a box of cereal is about $5. In the UK , the price would be about half that from what I remember.

Pulaski

That's those crazy PNW prices again! We pay about $2.75 +/- for milk, and about $1.75 for a loaf of wholegrain bread ($3.50 for a twin pack). We don't buy a lot of cereal, but I think the branded boxes are around $4, but we buy the store brand at about $2.50ish.

mrken30

We buy organic because we don't want GMO or growth hormones, I think you can probably buy the cheaper stuff for the prices you mention.

kodokan

That is STUNNINGLY cheap. Are two of them tiny babies, or do you eat out for a lot of meals that aren't included in that? We're a family of 4 with teens, so effectively 4 adults, and I can't get the bill much under $800.

Granted, that includes virtually every meal for the month - the kids take packed lunches to school and we don't eat out much. And alcohol's in there too. But $50-60 a week? That's around $2 per day per person. I could achieve sufficient but very repetitive calories on that, but not adequate long term nutrition.

tuxedocat

I'm poor and I thought 60K was low for that part too being so close to 3letter gov agencies.
Driving is more than just socializing you will need to get things done like shopping, going to the doctor or dentist. Even if your husband will spend Saturdays driving there will still be things during the week to. You will have to budget in cab fare.

The folks on here are not being negative towards you husband you have to realistically look at what healthcare and living will cost you. There are a lot of fees on most everything here too the price you see is not the price you walk out of the door with.

I would not do it to that area unless:
They pay for your moving and pay housing & utility cost for the first 3 months. A lot of utilities will want deposits to set it up.
You find out what will your insurance cost both of you and what is your deductible? What is the prescription plan?
They up his salary 15K

tuxedocat

We know where she is moving too though. It's also much easier for things to be hard in a place you know than a place you don't. Not having a car can be crippling if you don't have money for a taxi.