>>>>>>>>>Come to NYC and you will seldomly find bellow 90K.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>What's the cost of living in NYC in relation to what might be considered a 'larger city' in Iowa.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>Well, NYC is one of the most expensive cities in USA if we don't consider CA, where I believe the cost of living is higher. I don't know Iowa, but renting an apt. in Columbus, OH was 3 times cheaper than similar (and worse) apt. in NYC.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>In Iowa, I was renting a 3 bedroom older house for 375 a month + utils in college. In Cedar Falls, which is a larger city, I could probably rent a decent apartment for 800-900 a month.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>As far as buying, you can find a newer (built 2000+) ranch style 3-4 bedroom house with 2 stall garage and nice sized backyard for around 145K-170K.
>>>>>
>>>>>I paid $3200/month ren for a 1br loft in lower Manhattan NY - but the location was awsome.
>>>>
>>>>Wow! That is almost double my mortgage payment.
>>>
>>>Yeah it was outragous. I didn't do it very long and probably wouldn't do it again - but I wanted to see what all the NYC hype was about. It was a good experience but unless yer really into urban style living it'd get old pretty fast. Me....naaa - I'll stick with the beach!
>>
>>And I'll stick to the river.
>
>awwww..there's bigger fish in the ocean though! And the beach here has this other thing called bikini's..haha

There are bikini's on the Mississippi. I spent one very very crazy weekend there a few years ago, and trust me, there are bikini's. Don't underestimate farm girls.