6 Most Affordable, Fast Growing Cities in the U.S

By Josue Ledesma Cheapism.com

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The most desirable places to live are often among the most expensive. But some of the most popular cities in America now have below-average costs of living and affordable home prices. Some also boast low unemployment and competitive median incomes. To find these pockets of affordability, Cheapism.com started with a list of places that popped up most often on lists of the fastest-growing cities in the U.S. We whittled them down by combing through a range of vital stats on each one, seeking out the most recent publicly available data. We awarded the cities a score of 1 to 6 for each data point, based on where they fell relative to the competition. We gave the most weight to cost of living, as calculated by Sperling's, which accounts for housing, food, transportation, and health care, among other expenses. We also factored in median household incomes from the Census Bureau's American Community Survey, unemployment rates from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and, to a lesser extent, state and local income and sales tax rates from the Tax Foundation. The top six leans heavily toward the Lone Star State: Texas has a lot to recommend it right now.

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