Website ranks Houma in Top 10 for making a living

PERMITS
March 9, 2016
Anterina Guidry
March 9, 2016
PERMITS
March 9, 2016
Anterina Guidry
March 9, 2016

For those intrepid souls that want to build a life in a small city, Houma is one of the premier destinations, according to one personal finance website.

MoneyGeek.com ranked Houma as the eighth-best small city to make a living in. Houma was the only southern city in the top 10, and the only Louisiana city among the 40 listed.

MoneyGeek considered cities with populations under 100,000 and ranked them by affordability, based on comparing incomes to cost of living in the area. Houma’s income-to-cost ratio was at about 104 percent, while its cost of living index was rated below the national median.


Terrebonne Parish President Gordon Dove said in a press release that the MoneyGeek ranking supports local sentiments about the city.

“This ranking confirms what we believe about Houma – it’s a great city where the quality of life is good and you can affordably raise a family. It shows that you don’t have to spend your entire paycheck to live here,” Dove said.

Suzanne Carlos, president of the Houma-Terrebonne Chamber of Commerce, said the city’s low cost of living means local businesses can offer competitive wages while knowing their employees are getting good value for their bucks.


“For businesses in the area, it means their employees are able to live well with the salary that they are given. It means they are able to buy a house easily, pay for their groceries, these things are less than compared to other places in the country. Their money goes further, so that’s always good,” Carlos said.

Katherine Gilbert-Theriot, business retention and expansion director at the Terrebonne Economic Development Authority, said Terrebonne’s sales and property tax rates contribute to the area’s buying power, which helps its cost of living index. According to her, promising cost-of-living figures help bring in new companies to the area.

“You really want to bring companies into an area where you can do your business and do it efficiently and deliver your product but that is advantageous to your employees to move in and establish their homes and their lives,” Gilbert-Theriot said. “You don’t want to have to raise a lot of salaries just to move an employee into a community just because the cost of living is so high.”


Carlos said while cost-of-living is one part of employee welfare that businesses look at when picking locations to set up shop, Houma has other advantages that make it an attractive destination to employee and employer alike.

“Businesses want to locate in an area where their employees can live comfortably and enjoy life. A lower cost of living is part of that equation, but our area offers small town living with a great quality of life, and the added bonus of three larger cities within short driving distances,” Carlos said.

MoneyGeek did mention Houma’s current economic swoon related to the sluggish oil economy, however. It said Houma’s nonfarm employment fell 2.3 percent in the year to Oct. 2015, and current unemployment is at 6 percent, above the national average. The website said those “with the tenacity and luck to beat the odds in this city by finding a job and keeping it” will find Houma to present an affordable lifestyle.


Carlos said that the strong cost of living rates in Houma help not only attracting new businesses, but also retaining those already here. The low cost of living means companies can afford to hold onto employees longer during swoons like the city’s current one, according to Carlos.

The area must make sure that when the economy rebounds with the oil industry, the cost-of-living does not overheat with it.

Carlos called on the chamber and the public at large to do their part in keeping cost-of-living down by voicing their opinions to elected officials to let them know what they want in terms of regulations, taxes and services provided.


Gilbert-Theriot said many oil-related businesses have cut their expenses such as overtime wages in light of the downturn, but those costs will not shoot back up the instant the industry bounces back.

“Right now it’s kind of a holding pattern in trying to stabilize where we are in the community. It’s a time where I do see companies looking at their training budgets, looking at their infrastructure, and those with the wherewithal are kind of re-tooling and positioning themselves, just like those from outside the community,” Gilbert-Theriot said.

According to Gilbert-Theriot, those from outside the community are seeing this slowdown as an opportunity to move into the market while prices are low before the oil economy makes Houma a bull market again.


“We have been seeing some movement in the commercial sector in companies interested in properties and coming in. What I see is those with the wherewithal to do so are aligning themselves and positioning themselves for when the cycle comes back around in oil and gas,” Gilbert-Theriot said. •

Construction materials loaded up at the end of the Westside Boulevard Extension, near the Cameron Isle Apartments. Continued quality of life improvements in Houma make the city attractive for new businesses.KARL GOMMEL | THE TIMES