What Kind Of House Does $200K Get You In Montana Vs California?

Housing in Montana is a topic that is on a lot of people minds. We're constantly hearing about rising housing costs.  We're also always hearing how it's out of state transplants moving here and buying houses sight unseen for thousands more than the asking price.

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The one state the gets the lions share of the blame for that is California. Right or wrong, they are an easy scapegoat when so many celebrities and tech industry have migrated to Montana in recent years.

Keep scrolling to see what 200K gets in both Montana and California 👇

But what if the roles were reversed? What if you were moving to California and were looking to buy a house? How much of a house could you get for $200,000 when comparing Montana and California.

For our comparison we went with Great Falls in Montana and Hanford in California. We choose these two cities cause they are both similar in size, along with both being the biggest city in their county. The other reason is Hanford isn't a suburb of a major metropolis, which would drive prices up.

Let's start with what you could expect when house shopping in Great Falls.

This house is located at 1215 4th Ave S. It's 3 bedrooms with 2 baths and has 2,120 square footage. There is a 4th non-conforming room along with a detached 2 car garage that has a wood stove to heat in the winter.

Now lets take a look at Hanford, and what you can buy with $200,000.

Here we have a 2 bedroom 1 bath house with just 916 square footage. The listing is pretty short on details, and about the only thing they talk about is a big back yard, which could be used to install a pool. It does have central air so that's one thing it has on the house in Montana.

When looking at what you get in Montana compared to what you get in California, I understand why people are moving to states like ours.

Keep scrolling to see inside the penthouse in the historic Wilma Theater 👇