W-2 without dependents, nearest stations0 – $5,193 / month
San Francisco$5,193
Port Angeles$2,523
Oxford$2,520
Fresno$2,517
Kodiak Island$2,511
Sitka$2,511
Great Lakes Navtracen$2,496
Beaufort$2,487
St. Louis$2,484
Hampden County$2,481
Youngstown$1,224
Sitka is #96 of 338. The spread between
the dearest and cheapest station at this grade is $3,969 a month —
$47,628 a year, untaxed.
Every pay grade at Sitka0 – $3,504 / month
E-1$1,767
E-2$1,767
E-3$1,767
E-4$1,767
E-5$2,409
E-6$2,421
E-7$2,472
E-8$2,550
E-9$2,775
W-1$2,424
W-2$2,511
W-3$2,802
W-4$3,213
W-5$3,315
O-1E$2,484
O-2E$2,715
O-3E$3,189
O-1$2,418
O-2$2,475
O-3$2,886
O-4$3,294
O-5$3,348
O-6$3,444
O-7$3,504
Promoting to W-3 here adds $291 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 Sitka to San Francisco at W-2 is worth $2,682 a month — about 9 promotions worth of housing allowance, at $291 per grade here.
02
Dependency status is worth 33% 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. $2,511 a month of BAH takes more than $2,511 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.