Bend vs Burlington
Metro-area medians — Bend, OR Metro Area vs Burlington-South Burlington, VT Metro Area — not the cities proper.
Burlington comes out ahead, winning 6 of the 9 clearly-decided measures.
Bend and Burlington cost about the same to live in, but Bend households earn about 7% more. Adjusted for local prices, a typical paycheck stretches further in Bend.
For your salary & household
Enter your pay and household size to see what it's really worth here — the numbers update live and the link stays shareable.
On $75,000 for just you, Burlington leaves you about $4,480/yr better off after tax and local prices.
Take-home estimates a single filer taking the standard deduction (2025 federal brackets, FICA, and state income tax) and isn't tax advice. “Real value” rebases take-home to average U.S. prices using the BEA cost-of-living index; the per-person figure uses the OECD square-root equivalence scale.
Choose Bend for
- + Cost-adjusted income (pay's real value)
- + Median household income
- + Average commute
Choose Burlington for
- + Livability (CityLedger)
- + Median rent
- + Median home value
- + Unemployment
- + Bachelor's degree or higher
- + Air quality (median AQI)
Bend vs Burlington — frequently asked
- Is Bend cheaper than Burlington?
- They are about even — the overall cost of living in the Bend and Burlington metros is within 3% of each other (BEA Regional Price Parities), so neither is meaningfully cheaper.
- Which has higher household income, Bend or Burlington?
- Bend has the higher median household income — $95,979 versus $89,615 (U.S. Census Bureau, ACS), about 7% more.
- Does a paycheck go further in Bend or Burlington?
- A paycheck stretches further in Bend. Adjusted for local prices, the median income is worth $92,638 there versus $88,773 in Burlington.
- Which has cheaper rent, Bend or Burlington?
- Burlington has cheaper rent — a median of $1,631/mo versus $1,834/mo (U.S. Census Bureau, ACS).