Cost of Living
per year
per month
How Bellevue's prices compare to the US city average across major spending categories.
How far does your salary go in Bellevue?
Your $100,000 in Bellevue has the same purchasing power as $79,548 in the average US city. You'd need $20,452 more here to maintain that standard of living.
Demographics and workforce data from the US Census ACS 5-Year.
bachelor's or higher
Climate, safety, and walkability indicators.
See a side-by-side breakdown of cost of living, housing, and salaries.
Popular comparisons
Sorted by affordability — most affordable first.
Within 10 points of Bellevue's cost index of 126, sorted by closest match.
Bellevue has a handful of real selling points, and they're not the kind of thing you find in a brochure. Washington doesn't tax your paycheck and a high-income city, even by us standards are the headliners, plus 3 more things worth knowing. The rest is below.
Living in Bellevue means no state income tax on your salary — Washington is one of nine states that simply doesn't have one. On a $100k income that's typically thousands of dollars a year that stay in your account instead of going to a state revenue department. (Washington taxes some long-term capital gains over a high threshold, but ordinary wages and salaries are not taxed.)
Bellevue's typical household earns $149,551, which puts it in the top tier of US cities for household income. The bottom of the wage distribution isn't necessarily different from anywhere else, but the median and above sit meaningfully higher.
Average AQI in Bellevue comes in around 44, well into the "good" band. Clean air isn't a thing you appreciate until you've lived somewhere it wasn't — and this is the side of that line you want to be on.
Average commute time in Bellevue runs around 24 minutes one-way — short enough that it doesn't restructure your day. Compared to the 45-plus-minute commutes that are normal in major metros, the difference adds up to a real lifestyle gap.
Bellevue has a college-educated share of about 70% among adults 25+, which is higher than the national norm. It shows up in the local job mix, in the school district's reputation, and in the kind of conversations you have at the coffee shop.
Reasons are pulled from Bellevue's actual data — Census ACS, BLS, BEA, NOAA, EPA AQS, FBI, and Walk Score. We don't list positives that aren't supported by the numbers, which is why different cities show different sections.
Not really a snow town. With winters averaging 38°F, Bellevue sits in the mild-cold band where snowflakes appear occasionally and everything melts within a day. Most years see one storm worth talking about.
Cool, not cold. Winters in Bellevue sit around 38°F — sweater-and-jacket weather most days, with the occasional cold front that reminds you it's still winter.
Warm without being brutal. Summer in Bellevue sits about 75°F on average. Afternoons can push into the high 80s, but mornings and evenings are usually genuinely pleasant.
Bellevue falls in roughly USDA Zone 9. The zone classification is based on average annual minimum temperatures, so it's the right lookup for whether perennials and trees will overwinter here. Note that this is approximate from our winter-temperature data — check the USDA map for the exact zone before betting an expensive plant on it.
Around 295 feet (90 m) above sea level — flat enough that nothing about Bellevue's altitude shows up in daily life.
Middle of the pack. Bellevue comes in around 3,963 per 100,000, basically the national average. The interesting question is usually which neighborhood, not which city — that's where the real variation lives.
More expensive than average — by enough to plan around. Bellevue's composite index is 126 versus 100 for the US, with rent and home prices driving most of the gap. Salaries in higher-paying industries usually move together, but the math still tightens for everyone else.
Bellevue's Walk Score is 11/100, firmly in the car-required tier. Transit Score is 40 out of 100. The layout assumes you'll drive to the grocery store, drive to work, drive everywhere.
As a rule of thumb, plan on about $87,997 to live in Bellevue the way a $70,000 earner lives in a typical US city. The math gets less forgiving the lower you go below that. Median rent in Bellevue runs about $2,422/mo — keeping housing under 30% of gross income points to a similar floor on what you'd want to earn.