Overall
- Kingston
- 100.7
Diff -2.1 RPP
Kingston vs Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands
Cost of living comparison based on BEA Regional Price Parities. Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands is 2.1% less expensive than Kingston.
2.1% less expensive
Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands, TX is 2.1% less expensive than Kingston, NY on BEA Regional Price Parities (overall RPP 98.6 vs 100.7). A $100,000 salary in Kingston buys about the same as $97,935 in Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands; the largest component gap is services.
- Overall RPP 100.7 (Kingston) vs 98.6 (Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands)
- $100k in Kingston ≈ $97,935 purchasing power in Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands
- Services drives the gap (-38.3 RPP points)
RPP parity plate
Pair NY:TX 100.7→98.6
TIER-NEAR · CROSS-STATE · SPLIT-BUDGET · BENCH-CROSS · PP-PAR
- TIER-NEAR Near tier
- CROSS-STATE NY × TX
- SPLIT-BUDGET Split budget
- BENCH-CROSS Benchmark cross
- PP-PAR PP near-par
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.
Category Breakdown
Goods
- Kingston
- 99.7
Diff +0.9 RPP
Services
- Kingston
- 133.6
Diff -38.3 RPP
Rents
- Kingston
- 110.2
Diff -5.7 RPP
| Category | Kingston | Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 100.7 | 98.6 | -2.1 |
| Goods | 99.7 | 100.6 | +0.9 |
| Services | 133.6 | 95.3 | -38.3 |
| Rents | 110.2 | 104.5 | -5.7 |
Visual Comparison
Overall
Kingston 100.7
Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands 98.6
Goods
Kingston 99.7
Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands 100.6
Services
Kingston 133.6
Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands 95.3
Rents
Kingston 110.2
Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands 104.5
Vertical line = national average (100)
What This Comparison Actually Tells You
Services creates the largest separation: Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands is 38.3 points lower. But goods move against the overall direction, so this is a split budget rather than a clean across-the-board winner.
Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands, TX is 2.1% less expensive than Kingston, NY, a meaningful but not extreme shift. The move decision turns on which budget category creates the 2.1-point overall gap.
This route crosses the national benchmark: Kingston is above 100 while Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands is below it. That makes the move a change of price regime, not merely a rank swap.
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 Kingston to $97,935 in Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands, but it is not a personal spending weight.
Kingston
100.7
Cost Index
Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands
98.6
Cost Index
Salary Equivalents
What a salary in Kingston would need to be in Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands for the same purchasing power:
| In Kingston | In Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| $50,000 | $48,967 | $-1,033 |
| $75,000 | $73,451 | $-1,549 |
| $100,000 | $97,935 | $-2,065 |
| $150,000 | $146,902 | $-3,098 |
$ in Kingston = in Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands
Same BEA Regional Price Parity ratio as the table above (100.7 → 98.6), computed live from your number, nothing is sent anywhere.
How the Price Gap Changed
Kingston and Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands share 17 published annual releases from 2008 through 2024. Their overall gap narrowed, moving from 7.7 to 2.1 RPP points. Kingston remained the higher-index metro in the latest release.
Rents changed the most within this pair: its gap moved 33.4 points between the first and latest shared releases (39.1 to 5.7 points). This describes a relative price-index history, not a forecast or a household budget.
| Release Year | Kingston RPP | Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands RPP | Relative Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2008 | 107.1 | 99.4 | 7.7 points Kingston higher |
| 2012 | 102.0 | 100.0 | 2.0 points Kingston higher |
| 2016 | 101.2 | 102.4 | 1.2 points Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands higher |
| 2020 | 101.6 | 100.0 | 1.6 points Kingston higher |
| 2024 | 100.7 | 98.6 | 2.1 points Kingston 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.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands more expensive than Kingston?
Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands is 2.1% less expensive than Kingston. The overall cost index is 98.6 vs 100.7 (national average = 100).
What salary in Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands equals $100K in Kingston?
A $100,000 salary in Kingston has the same purchasing power as $97,935 in Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands. This is based on the BEA Regional Price Parity indexes.
How do rents compare between Kingston and Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands?
Rents in Kingston are indexed at 110.2 while Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands is at 104.5 (national average = 100). Kingston 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.