Pick a station below to see what the move is worth a year, before tax.
Orders rarely arrive as one option — add several and rank them.
Comparison uses with-dependents rates. Differences are annual and untaxed.
Rate protection is not applied — a PCS resets you to the new location's current-year rate.
O-2 with dependents, nearest stations0 – $5,451 / month
San Francisco$5,451
Marin$3,813
Miami$3,789
Washington$3,753
Essex CO$3,741
Burlington$3,732
New Haven$3,714
Chicago$3,699
Portsmouth$3,687
Vandenberg SFB$3,639
West Palm Beach$3,603
Portland$3,573
Riverside$3,546
Manchester$3,522
County Cost Group 890$3,519
Vallejo$3,495
Fitchburg$3,465
Providence$3,453
Newport$3,441
JB McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst$3,438
Santa Fe$3,411
Willow Grove$3,393
Youngstown$1,332
Portland is #40 of 338. The spread between the
dearest and cheapest station at this grade is $4,119 a month —
$49,428 a year, untaxed.
Every pay grade at Portland0 – $5,322 / month
E-1$3,087
E-2$3,087
E-3$3,087
E-4$3,087
E-5$3,252
E-6$3,576
E-7$3,825
E-8$4,098
E-9$4,425
W-1$3,597
W-2$3,936
W-3$4,272
W-4$4,482
W-5$4,740
O-1E$3,876
O-2E$4,221
O-3E$4,524
O-1$3,297
O-2$3,573
O-3$4,260
O-4$4,830
O-5$5,235
O-6$5,280
O-7$5,322
The pay chart moves this allowance far less than the map does.
Moving from Portland to San Francisco at O-2
is worth $1,878 a month — about 3 promotions at this grade.
Where you are stationed outweighs rank, by a lot.
What the rate table does not 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.