W-1 with dependents, nearest stations0 – $5,472 / month
San Francisco$5,472
Wilkes-Barre$1,902
Paducah$1,896
Robins AFB$1,893
Holloman AFB$1,887
Topeka$1,884
County Cost Group 730$1,881
Brownsville$1,878
Peoria$1,878
Springfield$1,878
Youngstown$1,350
Topeka is #270 of 338. The spread between
the dearest and cheapest station at this grade is $4,122 a month —
$49,464 a year, untaxed.
Every pay grade at Topeka0 – $2,655 / month
E-1$1,503
E-2$1,503
E-3$1,503
E-4$1,503
E-5$1,626
E-6$1,869
E-7$1,938
E-8$2,016
E-9$2,154
W-1$1,884
W-2$1,968
W-3$2,067
W-4$2,187
W-5$2,337
O-1E$1,950
O-2E$2,049
O-3E$2,211
O-1$1,662
O-2$1,866
O-3$2,064
O-4$2,385
O-5$2,619
O-6$2,637
O-7$2,655
Promoting to W-2 here adds $84 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 Topeka to San Francisco at W-1 is worth $3,588 a month — about 43 promotions worth of housing allowance, at $84 per grade here.
02
Dependency status is worth 28% 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. $1,884 a month of BAH takes more than $1,884 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.