What salary do you need to live in Paducah, KY?

What housing costs in Paducah

A one-bedroom in Paducah rents for a median of $629 a month, utilities the tenant pays included; a two-bedroom goes for $930 and a three-bedroom for $922. Over a full year, the two-bedroom median comes to $11,160.

Buying is the other half of the housing picture: owners put the median home in Paducah, KY-IL at $168,700. Against a median household income of $64,160, the ratio is 2.6× — one of the gentler home-price-to-income ratios in the country.

The Regional Price Parity, BEA's index of local prices with the US at 100, is 86.1 here. Below 100 means a paycheck stretches further: $100,000 in Paducah has the buying power of roughly $116,166 at national average prices.

The salary lines for a two-bedroom in Paducah

The salary lines for a two-bedroom household land at $18,000 for Tight, $41,000 for Okay and $81,000 for Comfortable. The gap between the Okay and Comfortable lines alone is $40,000, which says how much extra income it takes to make housing feel roomy here rather than merely workable.

Reaching Royal takes $223,000 — 2.8× the Comfortable line — because the last points come slowly once rent is already a small share.

Nothing here is a separate rule of thumb; plug any of these incomes into the calculator with two bedrooms and Paducah shows the matching grade.

Scores at $50K, $75K, $100K and $150K in Paducah

Take a $75,000 salary. In a one-bedroom the rent share is 10% and the score 69, Comfortable; in a three-bedroom the share rises to 15% and the score falls to 63, Okay.

Read down the two-bedroom column and the first Comfortable row is $100,000, consistent with the $81,000 line above.

Paducah compared with every US metro

On price level Paducah is 363rd of 387 (1 = most expensive); on two-bedroom rent it is 344th, and on median home value 353rd. Rent and overall prices don't line up exactly, with prices among the least expensive tenth and rent in the least expensive quarter.

Sandusky, OH ($935) and Texarkana, TX-AR ($930) bracket Paducah on two-bedroom rent.

Paducah next to Kentucky and similar metros

Compared with Kentucky as a whole, two-bedroom rent in Paducah is 4% lower ($930 vs. $968) and the median home is 18% lower ($168,700 vs. $205,600). The metro also reaches into Illinois; it is compared with Kentucky, home of its first-named principal city.

Run Kentucky's statewide medians through the same score and Comfortable begins at $100,000; Paducah's line is −19% from that.

If Paducah is on your list, Owensboro, KY, Huntington-Ashland, WV-KY-OH, and Elizabethtown, KY are the most similar Kentucky metros by two-bedroom rent and price level; the table shows where each turns Comfortable.

Does the typical Paducah income clear the bar?

A household at the Paducah median income of $64,160 would see a two-bedroom score of 58 — Okay — with rent at 17% of income. That falls $16,840 short of the $81,000 Comfortable line, a reminder that the typical household here spends a larger share on housing than the Comfortable band allows. For Kentucky as a whole, the median household income of $63,726 scores 52 against statewide rents. Keep in mind a household median often combines two incomes.

Estimates use pre-tax income and public data; they are not financial advice.