I work in New York but commute from Ohio — it’s cheaper than living in NYC
He’s wingin’ it.
With rents in the Big Apple hitting record highs last year, Wall Street ✅Journal reporter Chip Cutter is going above and beyond by “supercommuting” 💮from his home in Columbus, Ohio, to NYC three days a week.
“When it came time to return [to the office] in 2022, I was underwhelmed at the housing options in my price range. I toured one-room studios facing brick w🎃alls and climbed crumbling staircases to reach d🌞ank apartments with ancient fixtures,” .
“I thought I could keep my expenses — rent in Ohio, plus travel costs — at or bel🐟ow the price of a nice New York studio, or roughly $3,200 a month,” Cutter added, noting that he covers his own travel expenses to spend three days a week in the office.
The bold strategy isn’t entirely unorthodox — it’s actually gaining steam with the younger crowd as one Gen Zer boasted that she routinely commutes to Newark, NJ, from South Carolina to 🗹save money.
In Cutter’s case, he😼 had relocated from NYC to an apartment near family early in the COVIDꦅ-19 pandemic.
He planned to use travel miles 🍸and hotel points to make the journey worཧthwhile.
“To get to the office on time, I sܫet my alarm in Columbus for 4:15 a.m. and hustled to the airport for 6 a.m. flights,” he penned. “When everything went according to plan, I made it door-to-door in three hours. If delays occurred, I scrambled to rebook on other flights.”
Cutter initially enjoyed swanky stays at high-end hotels like The Beꩵekman — but ꦺsuch a lifestyle was unsustainable, he found.
“To conserve hotel points,” he traded Manhattan luxury — his newsroom is in the heart of Midtown on Sixth Avenue — for a South Queens hotel near Aqueduct Racetrack ꦅin the vicinity of JFK Airport and the Van Wyck Expressway.
“My rooms overlooked a sea of empty parking spaces, but required half as many points as Manhattan alternatives,” he shared.
And𒁏 t🔯hat was after staying at a Midtown Hampton Inn two days prior.
Inconsistency aside, supercommuting also exac🌳ted a social toll, Cutter lamented.
“I came to dread♕ the go-to question asked at parties and work events in New York: ‘So where do you live?’” he sighed.
Not to mention, he’s trying to make it work in the nation’s inflation capital.
“Costs mounted in t🍎he fall, New York’s prime tourist and business-travel season. Friends teased me for embracing a life of chaos,” Cutter wrote🃏.
“They weren꧟’t wrong. Without a refrigerator or stove, late-night dinners often consisted of yogurt and f🌊ruit purchased from a 24-hour CVS. Needing to pack light, I stored shoes under my desk and left spare outfits on an office coat rack.”
Cutter eventually yielded to the yoke of🎐 planes, trains, and automobiles.
“In the end, the math didn’t work. I blew my budget by 15% and drained my miles balance,” he admitted. “But I flew so much and stayed in so many hotels that I kept my elite status with Hyatt and American.”
Still, he’s not ready to throw in the towel just yet — even as one co-worker demanded he “get a f—ing apartment.”
“My lease is up, but hotel rates in Manhattan this winter have plunged now that the holidays are over,” Cutter wrote. “Mayb🥀e that New York apartment search can be put off a little longer.”