Overall
- Boise City
- 98.4
Diff -2.6 RPP
Charleston-North Charleston vs Boise City
Cost of living comparison based on BEA Regional Price Parities. Boise City is 2.5% less expensive than Charleston-North Charleston.
2.5% less expensive
Boise City, ID is 2.5% less expensive than Charleston-North Charleston, SC on BEA Regional Price Parities (overall RPP 98.4 vs 101.0). A $100,000 salary in Charleston-North Charleston buys about the same as $97,453 in Boise City; the largest component gap is services.
- Overall RPP 101.0 (Charleston-North Charleston) vs 98.4 (Boise City)
- $100k in Charleston-North Charleston ≈ $97,453 purchasing power in Boise City
- Services drives the gap (-17.5 RPP points)
RPP parity plate
Pair SC:ID 101.0→98.4
TIER-NEAR · CROSS-STATE · SERVICES-LED · BENCH-CROSS · PP-SHIFT
- TIER-NEAR Near tier
- CROSS-STATE SC × ID
- SERVICES-LED Services-led gap
- BENCH-CROSS Benchmark cross
- PP-SHIFT PP shift
Instrument codes from this pair's BEA Regional Price Parities (overall · goods · services · rents · national benchmark 100 · purchasing-power conversion), not a ranking or recommendation.
What This Comparison Actually Tells You
Boise City, ID is 2.5% less expensive than Charleston-North Charleston, SC, a meaningful but not extreme shift. The move decision turns on which budget category creates the 2.6-point overall gap.
This route crosses the national benchmark: Charleston-North Charleston is above 100 while Boise City is below it. That makes the move a change of price regime, not merely a rank swap.
Services leads the difference, with Boise City 17.5 points lower than Charleston-North Charleston. Goods, services, and rents all point in the same broad direction, making the headline comparison more transferable across household types.
Comparable population context is incomplete for this pair, so no market-scale explanation is inferred from the price indexes.
For a service-heavy household, test childcare, health, and other locally supplied costs before relying on rent alone. The BEA ratio converts $100,000 in Charleston-North Charleston to $97,453 in Boise City, but it is not a personal spending weight.
How the Price Gap Changed
Charleston-North Charleston and Boise City share 17 published annual releases from 2008 through 2024. Their overall gap held broadly steady, moving from 2.2 to 2.6 RPP points. Charleston-North Charleston remained the higher-index metro in the latest release.
Rents changed the most within this pair: its gap moved 10.4 points between the first and latest shared releases (3.8 to 14.2 points). This describes a relative price-index history, not a forecast or a household budget.
| Release Year | Charleston-North Charleston RPP | Boise City RPP | Relative Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2008 | 97.4 | 95.3 | 2.2 points Charleston-North Charleston higher |
| 2012 | 100.3 | 96.7 | 3.7 points Charleston-North Charleston higher |
| 2016 | 99.7 | 93.2 | 6.6 points Charleston-North Charleston higher |
| 2020 | 98.0 | 93.6 | 4.4 points Charleston-North Charleston higher |
| 2024 | 101.0 | 98.4 | 2.6 points Charleston-North Charleston higher |
Annual BEA Regional Price Parity releases; a higher index means a higher price level relative to the national average of 100. Selected years shown from the full shared series.
Category Breakdown
Goods
- Boise City
- 96.2
Diff -0.2 RPP
Services
- Boise City
- 70.7
Diff -17.5 RPP
Rents
- Boise City
- 105.6
Diff -14.2 RPP
| Category | Charleston-North Charleston | Boise City | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 101.0 | 98.4 | -2.6 |
| Goods | 96.3 | 96.2 | -0.2 |
| Services | 88.2 | 70.7 | -17.5 |
| Rents | 119.8 | 105.6 | -14.2 |
Visual Comparison
Overall
Charleston-North Charleston 101.0
Boise City 98.4
Goods
Charleston-North Charleston 96.3
Boise City 96.2
Services
Charleston-North Charleston 88.2
Boise City 70.7
Rents
Charleston-North Charleston 119.8
Boise City 105.6
Vertical line = national average (100)
Salary Equivalents
What a salary in Charleston-North Charleston would need to be in Boise City for the same purchasing power:
| In Charleston-North Charleston | In Boise City | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| $50,000 | $48,727 | $-1,273 |
| $75,000 | $73,090 | $-1,910 |
| $100,000 | $97,453 | $-2,547 |
| $150,000 | $146,180 | $-3,820 |
$ in Charleston-North Charleston = in Boise City
Same BEA Regional Price Parity ratio as the table above (101.0 → 98.4), computed live from your number, nothing is sent anywhere.
Charleston-North Charleston
101.0
Cost Index
Boise City
98.4
Cost Index
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Boise City more expensive than Charleston-North Charleston?
Boise City is 2.5% less expensive than Charleston-North Charleston. The overall cost index is 98.4 vs 101.0 (national average = 100).
What salary in Boise City equals $100K in Charleston-North Charleston?
A $100,000 salary in Charleston-North Charleston has the same purchasing power as $97,453 in Boise City. This is based on the BEA Regional Price Parity indexes.
How do rents compare between Charleston-North Charleston and Boise City?
Rents in Charleston-North Charleston are indexed at 119.8 while Boise City is at 105.6 (national average = 100). Charleston-North Charleston has higher rents.
Data sources
- BEA Regional Price Parities (RPP), the cost-of-living indices shown on this page
- U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey (ACS), gross-rent observations behind the rents component
- BLS Consumer Price Index (CPI), goods and services price relatives
- BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS), labor-driven services component
- HUD Fair Market Rents (FMR), 40th-percentile rent cross-reference
Every figure on PlainCost is rendered directly from BEA Regional Price Parity source data, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, our changelog, or report a data error. Data current as of 2026-08-11. Rankings measure the published cost-of-living index only; we don't recommend where to live or rate any metro's quality of life.