The 10 Cheapest Places To Live In Kansas For 2022

The 10 Cheapest Places To Live In Kansas For 2022

Chanute is a city in Neosho County, Kansas, United States. Founded on January 1, 1873, it was named after railroad engineer and aviation pioneer Octave Chanute. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 9,119. Chanute is home of Neosho County Community College.

The first thing to know when you show up in Arkansas City — pronounce the “s” at the end of Arkansas, or you’ll surely be put down as a carpetbagger. Once you’ve got that down and you’re ready to buy a home, you’re in luck, because Arkansas City has the fourth least expensive homes for sale in Kansas at a median price of $66,900. Even more importantly, residents of Arkansas City pay the lowest proportion of their income on homes statewide. With all these awesome statistics, why isn’t Arkansas City ranked higher? Unfortunately, it’s the least affordable place for renters on this list. Regardless of your housing situation, everyone will appreciate the gorgeous trails and excellent fishing opportunities at Cowley Lake Waterfall.

In terms of affordability, there’s nowhere better in Kansas than Pratt, a small city 80 miles west of Wichita. Pratt has the 13th cheapest homes on the market in Kansas, with a median price tag of $95,300. Even more importantly, Pratt residents pay the eighth smallest percentage of their income on homes statewide. Which means there’s plenty of money left over to experience Pratt’s high culture at both its art museum and history museum. Or if you’re trying to keep things cheap, Pratt’s got you covered with 270 acres of parks.

Newton, Kansas, has some Wild West cred. It grew up during the 19th century as an key railroad hub for the cattle industry. Texas cattle came up to Newton and was shipped throughout the rest of the country. Newton even has its own famous shootout: the 1871 Gunfight at Hide Park.

The town has advanced a lot since those cowboy days. And it serves one of the cheapest places to live in all of Kansas.

For a modest-sized town, Newton has extremely reasonable housing prices. The median home value sits at $109,100, while the median rent comes in at $735 per month. On the strength of this low-cost housing, the town’s overall cost of living stands at about 90% the national average.

Speaking of homes, Newton features the Warkentin House, a Victorian mansion built in the late 19th century that now serves as museum. The town also offers some more modern amenities. A half-hour drive will take you to downtown Wichita.

Checking out some other economic indicators, the residents of Newton receive a median income of $56,729. At the same time, they experience an unemployment rate of 2.71%.

A suburb of Wichita, Mulvane is the fifth least expensive city in Kansas. Mulvane scored an 8.5/10 on our overall Snackability scale, meaning the city has good schools, safe streets, a steady job market, and, of course, affordable housing.

Renting in Mulvane is absurdly cheap, with the median rent being $676/month. That’s about 60% less than the average rent in Kansas, which is already much lower than the national average. And coupled with a median income of $65,286, Mulvane has the most affordable rent in Kansas. Seeing as you’re already pretty lucky to live in such a great place for such a low price, consider letting your luck ride at the Kansas Star Casino.

Winfield is a city and county seat of Cowley County, Kansas, United States. It is situated along the Walnut River in South Central Kansas. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 12,301 and second most populous city of Cowley County.

Located in the Smoky Hills region of North Central Kansas, Concordia ranks as the seventh cheapest place to live in Kansas. The city home to Camp Concordia, a WWII German POW camp that’s a definite must-see for any history buff in the area. Homes in Concordia go for about $76,400, the eighth lowest in Kansas. And with residents earning a median income of $44,185, Concordia has the sixth best home price to income ratio in the state.

Colby is a city in and the county seat of Thomas County, Kansas, United States. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 5,387.

Ranking as the ninth most affordable place in Kansas is Wellington, a city about 30 miles south of Wichita. Homes in Wellington go for around $82,700, the ninth cheapest in the state. Having a median income of $48,279 gives Wellington the fifth best home price to income ratio in Kansas. And don’t worry that living in such an affordable place must be boring; between three museums, a golf course, and a water park, there’s plenty to do in Wellington.

There’s good news and bad news when it comes to Parsons, our tenth most affordable city in Kansas. The good news is that Parsons has the third cheapest homes for sale statewide at a median price of $64,600 and residents have the fourth easiest time paying off their mortgage. The bad news is that Parsons population has been steadily dwindling in recent years, and not without reason. Parsons ranks as one of the worst places to live in Kansas, due to a 20%+ poverty rate and a crime rate 75% over the national average.

Parsons is the second most populous city in southeastern Kansas.

Cheapest Places To Live In Kansas FAQs

What county in Kansas has the lowest cost of living?

The county in Kansas with the lowest cost of living is Woodson County. The average living wage in Woodson County is $80,268 according to MIT data. Woodson County has the lowest cost of living because it has relatively less expensive childcare and housing costs compared to Kansas as a whole. Childcare costs $8,896 a year in Woodson County for two children compared to the Kansas average of $15,029. Housing costs, defined as a blend of the average rent and average mortgage payment, are $8,616 per year in Woodson County compared to $10,455 on average in Kansas.

What is the cost of living in Kansas?

The cost of living in Kansas is 0.4% lower than the US average. According to MIT, the required living wage for a family of four with two working parents in Kansas is $89,353 vs the national average for a family of four with two working parents of $89,744. The median income of a Kansas household is $61,091.

What is the cheapest housing market in Kansas?

The cheapest housing market in Kansas is Coffeyville. The average home value in Coffeyville is $53,100, the lowest in the state. The average home value in Kansas is $157,600, almost 3.0 times higher than Coffeyville.

Methodology: How We Determined The Most Affordable Places To Live In The Sunflower State For 2022

The two most important things to think about when it comes to being able to afford if you can live comes down to:

1. How much do money do I make?
2. How much do I have spend to live there?

You need to understand your costs in the context of how much money you make.

For example, if the median household earns $100,000 and spends $40,000 on housing it’s actually cheaper to live there than a place with a median income of $50,000 and housing costs of $21,000. You might spend more on housing, but you have more money overall to play with.

With that example in mind, we derived several statistics from the latest Census American Community Survey 2016-2020 around incomes and costs. They are:

• Median Home Price / Median Income (lower is better)
• Median Income / Median Rent (Higher is better)
• Median Home Price

We added simply median home price because high home prices generally correlate with higher expenses for all costs related to homes (heating, electricity, etc).

You can then compare these metrics in each of the places in Kansas to figure out which is the least expensive.

What you are left with is a “Cost of Living Index” by taking the average rank of each of these metrics for each city.

So we used that cost of living index in order to rank all of the 62 places in Kansas that have more than 5,000 people.

The place with the lowest cost of living in Kansas according to the data is Chanute. You can download the data here.