doxo,
the innovative web and mobile bill pay service, today released America’s
Household Bills, Unbundled, the first-ever report
analyzing what Americans are paying for their monthly bills in the 25
largest U.S. metros. The doxoINSIGHTS
report from the company’s data analytics team provides a unique and
enlightening look showing that the average American household pays $984
per month, or 17% of their household income1, on the nine
most common bills, excluding housing expenses like rent or mortgage.
doxoINSIGHTS analyzes aggregate payment statistics to more than 45,000
billers across 45 different service categories from over 2.5 million
users to uncover the actual, unfiltered average cost consumers pay for
key household bills and share it in a collective snapshot. doxo’s data
is based on anonymized, aggregated statistics from actual payments made
by millions of households for key services, and thereby avoids the
self-reported estimates and inaccuracies inherent to standard consumer
polling methods of typical industry reports.
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doxoINSIGHTS reveals the recurring, household expenses nationally and by bill type across 25 metros (Graphic: Business Wire)
Show Me the Money!
While the national average on monthly household expenses is $984 per
household, the report found that the Miami metro, with a median
household income of $52,667, surprisingly has the highest cost for
monthly bill expenses – $1,157 – compared to metros such as San
Francisco or Washington D.C., where the average household income exceeds
$88,000. Charlotte locals have the lowest average monthly bill expenses
at $869.
25 Largest Metro Areas2 (Most to least
expensive for the nine most common household bills)
1. $1,157 Miami
2.
$1,126 New
York
3. $1,096 Los
Angeles
4. $1,073 San
Francisco
5. $1,070 Washington
6.
$1,062 Philadelphia
7.
$1,061 Detroit
8.
$1,056 Pittsburgh
9.
$1,037 Houston
10.
$1,036 Boston
11.
$1,015 Denver
12.
$991 Dallas
13.
$989 Portland
14.
$976 Chicago
15.
$958 Seattle
16.
$949 Orlando
17.
$941 Sacramento
18.
$940 Columbus
19.
$923 Minneapolis
20.
$923 Salt
Lake City
21. $921 Cleveland
22.
$911 Kansas
City
23. $899 St.
Louis
24. $876 Atlanta
25.
$869 Charlotte
“doxo’s mission is to make it super simple to stay on top of due dates
and pay bills with a click. And a critical part of this mission is
making information transparent for our users and participating billers
alike, so they can compare expenses to their area average, overall, and
by type of service. This first-ever report covers the nine most common
bills, making up nearly $12,000 of household spend each year on average.
It’s a huge part of the typical household budget, so it’s helpful to see
how these expenses stack up,” says Steve Shivers, CEO of doxo.
“Information and transparency empower both users and providers, and
doxoINSIGHTS reports enable consumers to make better decisions, reduce
unnecessary expenses, and improve their financial outcomes.”
The findings outline the average costs of the top nine most common
household bills, excluding mortgage or rent payments, including: Alarm &
Security, Auto Insurance, Auto Loans, Cable, Internet & Phone, Mobile
Phone, Health Insurance, Dental Insurance, Life Insurance, and Utilities
(i.e., water, gas, electricity, waste, etc.).
Together, they make up America’s Bundle of Bills, where the
combined auto-related bills (loans and insurance) far and away are the
highest average monthly expense for Americans at $614, or 10.8% of the
average household income.
Top 25 Metro Average Spend of the Most Common Monthly Bills Paid,
Most to Least Expensive:
- Auto Loans: $376
- Auto Insurance: $238
- Utilities: $237
- Health Insurance: $136
- Life Insurance: $124
- Cable, Satellite, Internet & Phone: $118
- Mobile Phone: $98
- Alarm & Security: $82
- Dental Insurance: $35
Netflix and Bill
More than four in five American households (82%) pay a cable or
satellite bill, averaging $118 per month. This number jumps in the North
East, however, with Boston specifically averaging $138 per bill, or 117%
of the national average. It’s the lowest in Miami, averaging $107 per
bill, $31 less than what Boston pays.
Game Faces On
East coast vs. West coast; Chicago deep dish or thin crust New York
style pizza; LeBron James or James Harden – Americans love to pit their
city’s favorites in friendly (or not-so-friendly) rivalries. The data
provided by doxoINSIGHTS offers an opportunity to look at a breakdown of
each metro to see how it holds up against other locales.
Bruins vs. Penguins
Boston and Pittsburgh are longtime rivals within the hockey world and
are nearly tied when it comes to the total monthly spend on household
bills:
- Boston, Massachusetts: $1,036
- Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: $1,056
When it comes down to the real test of how they rank in spend by percent
of household income, however, Boston wins by a landslide, at 4th place
in terms of affordability with Pittsburgh ranked at 24th, with its
residents’ bills making up the second highest percentage of income of
all 25 metros.
-
Boston, Massachusetts: 16% of total household income goes to monthly
recurring expenses -
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: 23% of total household income goes to
monthly recurring expenses
Sounders vs. Timbers
If you’re going to call, text or stream from the big match on your
mobile, folks in Seattle will pay 11% more on average than the top 25
markets and 16% more than their friendly rivals to the South in
Portland, who pay 4% less than the top 25 average.
Yankees vs. Red Sox
Boston takes another win when it comes to one of the oldest and most
famous baseball rivalries, Boston vs. New York. Boston’s average monthly
spend on household bills puts it at 5 percent above the national
average, while New York sits 9 percent higher.
Convertibles vs SUVs
Those in Miami who crave their daily sun pay 42% more for auto insurance
than the average top 25 metros for the privilege of driving
convertibles. While folks living in the Salt Lake City area, who can ski
practically year-round, pay 23% less than the top 25 metro average in
auto insurance to tackle the terrain in SUVs.
doxoINSIGHTS goes deeper than the standard polling approach of common
industry reports, because the data is not based on self-reported
estimates of expenses, but rather actual payment trends aggregated
across millions of users. The contributing factor is doxoINSIGHTS sample
size. Whereas an average industry survey will poll a few hundred or a
thousand participants and relies on them to report their spending, doxo
has access to anonymized data from more than 2.5 million paying users
across the United States and sees actual spending month to month.
Additionally, doxoINSIGHTS is capable of isolating individual bill
categories and filter by region.
For the first time, consumers can now see the unfiltered, breakdown cost
of the most common monthly bills and gain valuable insight into how
their own bills compare to others in their area, and other metros around
the country.
To view more on doxoINSIGHTS and its America’s Household Bills,
Unbundled, including a full breakdown of the top 25 largest
metros and the amount paid in household bills, click
here.
About doxo
doxo
is a simple, secure all-in-one bill pay service that facilitates secure
payment to any biller, with any payment method, on any device. doxo
currently serves over 2.5 million users who make payments to over 45,000
local and national businesses, making doxo the largest bill pay
directory in the nation. Billers
on the network get paid directly, fast and free – and consumers have
complete bill pay independence over when and how they pay their bills.
doxo more than doubled its customer base in 2018 and is expanding its
team to further accelerate growth and change the bill pay landscape to
focus on the customer. doxo investors include MDV, Sigma Partners, and
Bezos Expeditions. doxo is based in Seattle, WA.
For more information about doxo, visit www.doxo.com.
About doxoINSIGHTS
doxoINSIGHTS
is designed to provide the best possible look into the average American
household’s monthly bills and relies on anonymized data from doxo’s 2.5M
customers, paying more than 45,000 billers. doxo’s vast amount of data
gives a uniquely accurate perspective into what households are actually
paying for their bills and provides a sound basis for constructing an
accurate gauge of relative differences in the cost of the most common
monthly bills across America. doxo’s data is based on anonymized,
aggregated statistics from actual payments made by millions of
households for key services, and thereby avoids the self-reported
estimates and inaccuracies inherent to standard consumer polling methods
of typical industry reports.. The largest contributing factor is
doxoINSIGHTS sample size. Whereas an average industry survey will poll a
few hundred or a thousand participants, doxo has access to data from
more than 2.5 million paying users across the United States, and their
aggregated routine, monthly household expenses. Additionally,
doxoINSIGHTS is capable of isolating bill categories and filtering by
region.
For more information about the methodology, visit https://www.doxo.com/insights/.
1 United States Census Bureau Report – Household
Income: 2017
2United
States Office of Management and Budget Combined Statistical Areas
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190430005241/en/