MetroWest's Cost Of Living Ranks Higher Than Boston

MERC, C2ER Cost of living in the 13 MetroWest communities tracked by MERC is higher than nearly all of the other New England metro areas tracked.

Matt PIlon Dale Hamel (left), executive vice president at Framingham State University poses with Prof. Donald MacRitchie at last week's MERC event.

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Cost of living in the nine-town stretch of MetroWest between Hopkinton and Natick ranks above that of Boston, according to a report released last week by Framingham State University.

The school's MetroWest Economic Research Center (MERC) issued its cost of living index – which it gathers and shares with a national organization called C2ER that tracks national prices – last week at its 21st annual conference at the Verve Crowne Plaza in Natick.

Housing Drives Cost

Some might be surprised to hear it costs more to live in MetroWest than in Boston, but MERC measures costs in nine communities that are mostly affluent. They include Ashland, Framingham, Holliston Hopkinton, Natick, Sherborn, Southborough, Sudbury and Wayland.

The average household income of those communities is more than $156,000, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. The state average is $106,335. The city of Boston's is $92,827.

And the housing costs are what you might expect in the MetroWest grouping of communities, said Donald MacRitchie, a professor and MERC member.

"Housing costs in MetroWest are a clear driver behind the high cost of living in this area," he said.

As of April 2012, housing costs were more than 103 percent higher than the national average, according to MERC's index, while overall cost of living is 43 percent higher.

Meanwhile, Boston's housing costs are 71.7 percent higher than the national average, while its overall cost of living index is 40.6 percent higher.

In New England, MetroWest was second only to Stamford, Conn., which has an overall cost of living index value 46.7 percent above average.

The MetroWest cost index was down 2.2 percent from a year ago, which is unusual. MacRitchie said the typical trend over the years has been a steady increase.

Promising Stats

Greater MetroWest, a term MERC uses to describe the nine towns mentioned above plus Hudson, Marlborough, Northborough and Westborough, saw its already relatively low unemployment rate of 5.1 percent in 2011 drop to 4.5 percent in 2012.

In Feb. 2013, all 13 communities in the group posted a lower unemployment rate than the Massachusetts rate of 6.8 percent and the U.S. rate of 8.1 percent.

"It's great news to see the unemployment rates declining," said Maureen Dunne, a business economics professor and MERC member.

Another promising number, Dunne said, is growth in the number of establishments in the region. After flat lining between 2005 and 2009 at just above 10,000, the number rose 2.4 percent in 2011 to 10,550.

It may not sound like much, but the growth is important, Dunne said, because employment at the average establishment in the region has fallen from 18 to 16.8 since the peak before the recession. So growth, however small, will be important to lowering the unemployment rate moving forward, Dunne said.

Payroll Growth

The largest portion of MetroWest's $12.5 billion payroll is professional and business services, which accounts for just over a quarter of that total. Second is manufacturing at $2.97 billion. Trade, transport and utilities ranks third at $1.86 billion.

Wages have grown from $52,000 to nearly $71,000 from 2001 to 2011, but the real growth – which includes inflation – is just 5.4 percent over the decade.

Correction: The original version of this story excluded Southborough from the nine-town grouping for which MERC tracks cost of living data.