What salary do you need to live in Santa Rosa, CA?

Santa Rosa housing costs at a glance

Renters in Santa Rosa pay a median $2,207 a month for two bedrooms. Size matters: one bedroom is $1,666, three bedrooms $2,780, so going from the smallest to the largest of the three adds $13,368 a year.

Buying is the other half of the housing picture: owners put the median home in Santa Rosa-Petaluma, CA at $815,500. Set against the $104,674 median household income, that is a ratio of 7.8×, which keeps the buying part of the score low for most incomes.

The Regional Price Parity, BEA's index of local prices with the US at 100, is 107.8 here. Above 100 means a paycheck stretches less: $100,000 in Santa Rosa has the buying power of roughly $92,778 at national average prices.

The salary lines for a two-bedroom in Santa Rosa

With a two-bedroom at the median rent, the score enters Tight at $109,000, Okay at $219,000 and Comfortable at $441,000 a year before tax. At the Comfortable line, a year of rent takes 6% of income and the median home is 1.8× income.

No salary reaches Royal in Santa Rosa: a fifth of the score reflects local prices rather than income, and with a parity of 107.8 the ceiling is 85 points, below the Royal cutoff of 85.

Each figure is the lowest income, to the next $1,000, at which the calculator itself would show that grade for a two-bedroom in Santa Rosa.

Four salaries, three home sizes in Santa Rosa

At $75,000 home size barely changes the picture: one, two and three bedrooms all grade Stretched, with scores from 11 to 19.

In Santa Rosa the table's top salary of $150,000 stops at Tight (34) for two bedrooms; Comfortable starts higher, at $441,000.

How Santa Rosa ranks among 387 metros

Out of 387 metros, Santa Rosa has the 20th highest price parity and the 8th highest two-bedroom rent, which puts it in the top 10% on overall prices and among the priciest tenth on rent.

Its nearest neighbors on the rent list are Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA ($2,210) and Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH ($2,155).

Santa Rosa next to California and similar metros

Compared with California as a whole, two-bedroom rent in Santa Rosa is 5% higher ($2,207 vs. $2,103) and the median home is 11% higher ($815,500 vs. $734,700).

On statewide medians, a two-bedroom budget reaches Comfortable at $439,000 — below Santa Rosa's $441,000 line.

Looking for somewhere comparable without leaving California? Santa Maria-Santa Barbara, CA, Oxnard-Thousand Oaks-Ventura, CA, and Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA have the closest mix of rent and overall prices.

Does the typical Santa Rosa income clear the bar?

What about a typical local household? Census puts median household income here at $104,674, which grades Stretched (24) for a two-bedroom at the median rent. The Comfortable line is 321% above what the median household makes. Statewide, the California median household ($99,122) grades Stretched on the state's own medians. Since a household can have two or more earners, compare it with a combined income rather than one paycheck.

Treat every number here as a pre-tax, public-data estimate rather than financial advice.