E-8 without dependents, nearest stations0 – $5,196 / month
San Francisco$5,196
Essex CO$3,537
Perth Amboy$3,531
Chicago$3,498
West Palm Beach$3,465
Marin$3,411
Vallejo$3,402
Portsmouth$3,399
Vandenberg SFB$3,399
Riverside$3,396
Youngstown$1,248
Marin is #32 of 338. The spread between
the dearest and cheapest station at this grade is $3,948 a month —
$47,376 a year, untaxed.
Every pay grade at Marin0 – $4,203 / month
E-1$2,529
E-2$2,529
E-3$2,529
E-4$2,529
E-5$2,967
E-6$3,201
E-7$3,252
E-8$3,411
E-9$3,561
W-1$3,249
W-2$3,408
W-3$3,579
W-4$3,843
W-5$3,966
O-1E$3,300
O-2E$3,528
O-3E$3,813
O-1$3,198
O-2$3,291
O-3$3,630
O-4$3,939
O-5$4,011
O-6$4,128
O-7$4,203
Promoting to E-9 here adds $150 a
month. The pay chart moves this allowance far less than the map does.
01
Where you are stationed outweighs what you are paid. Moving from Marin to San Francisco at E-8 is worth $1,785 a month — about 12 promotions worth of housing allowance, at $150 per grade here.
02
Dependency status is worth 19% here. That is a status your finance office determines, not a box you tick — and it is the single largest lever on this page that is not a change of address.
03
None of it is taxed. $3,411 a month of BAH takes more than $3,411 of basic pay to match, which is why comparing a civilian salary against military base pay alone understates the gap.
Ad slot — in-content, after the answerPlaced below the number, never above it. VA-loan and PCS-move advertisers bid here.
Things the rate table doesn't tell you
01
“With dependents” is a dependency status, not a marital status. A single member paying child support can be authorized BAH-Diff; a married dual-military couple with no children is not automatically the with-dependents rate for both. If your situation is unusual, your finance office decides — not this table.
02
O-8, O-9 and O-10 draw the same BAH as O-7. The table stops there for a reason, not because it is missing rows.
03
This is CONUS BAH only. Overseas is OHA, which works differently — it reimburses actual rent up to a cap, with separate utility and move-in allowances. Alaska and Hawaii are BAH; Germany, Japan and Korea are OHA.