Cost of Living
per year
per month
How Des Moines's prices compare to the US city average across major spending categories.
How far does your salary go in Des Moines?
Your $100,000 in Des Moines has the same purchasing power as $112,562 in the average US city. You'd need $12,562 less 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 Des Moines's cost index of 89, sorted by closest match.
Des Moines has a handful of real selling points, and they're not the kind of thing you find in a brochure. Your dollar carries more weight here and safer than the typical us city are the headliners, plus 3 more things worth knowing. The rest is below.
The composite cost-of-living index lands at 89, a comfortable 11% under the US norm. It shows up most clearly in housing, which is where the gap to coastal metros usually opens up. Median rent in town runs about $995/mo against a typical household income of $62,378, which is the kind of ratio that leaves room to save.
Reported crime in Des Moines comes in around 2,692 per 100,000 — under the national baseline of about 3,500. Worth digging into specific neighborhoods before settling on one, but the city-level picture is on the safer side.
Bike Score of 63/100 in Des Moines. That puts it in the small group of US cities where you can do groceries, commute, and run errands on a bike without it being a feat of urban survival.
Average AQI in Des Moines comes in around 37, 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 Des Moines runs around 20 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.
Reasons are pulled from Des Moines'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.
Yes — and a lot of it. With winter averages near 17°F, Des Moines sees real accumulation most years. Salt for the steps, tires that handle ice, and a sense of humor about February are the usual costs of admission.
Properly cold. Des Moines's winter sits around 17°F on average — and that's the average, meaning plenty of nights drop well below zero. People here own gear.
Reliably warm. Des Moines's summer averages around 84°F, the kind of heat where you remember to leave the house before noon for outdoor things and accept that the back of your shirt will be wet by lunchtime.
Des Moines falls in roughly USDA Zone 7. 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.
Roughly 801 feet (244 m). That's modest elevation — comparable to most inland-Midwest and Southern cities.
Middle of the pack. Des Moines comes in around 2,692 per 100,000, basically the national average. The interesting question is usually which neighborhood, not which city — that's where the real variation lives.
Des Moines is a genuinely affordable city by US standards. The composite index sits at 89 versus the 100 national baseline — about 11% cheaper overall, with housing doing most of the heavy lifting.
In parts, yes. With a citywide Walk Score of 50/100, Des Moines has genuinely walkable neighborhoods alongside more sprawled stretches. Transit Score is 32 out of 100. If walkability matters to you, the neighborhood choice will matter more than the city-level number.
As a rule of thumb, plan on about $62,188 to live in Des Moines 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 Des Moines runs about $995/mo — keeping housing under 30% of gross income points to a similar floor on what you'd want to earn.