The Best Moving Companies in Irvine

With a monthly total cost of $3,062, Irvine has the country’s highest cost of living.¹ The city’s $2,364 median contract rent is the biggest portion of this total, and it’s also the highest rent we found for our list of cities with the highest living costs.

One small piece of good news is that Irvine—as part of California—has a minimum wage of $15.00 per hour for employers with 25 employees or more.² This is a recent change, too, reflecting a shift in policy towards making the state more affordable for more people.

Unfortunately, you’d still need to work a little over 157 hours a month making minimum wage in Irvine just to pay the city’s median rent, let alone buy food, pay your utility bills, or afford a nice apartment. Overall, despite the city’s increased minimum wage, it’s still among the nation’s most unaffordable cities for minimum wage earners.

Irvine is home to several colleges and universities, including prestigious institutions like University of California, Irvine and UMass Global. And since Irvine is so close to Silicon Valley, it’s a great place to network with future employers while you study for a tech degree.

The bad news is that the city is also one of the least affordable college towns in the US. This means that studying in Irvine isn’t really an option for most students unless they’re willing to go into massive debt for their degrees.

Irvine is part of the Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim Metro Area, which we’ve found to have some of the priciest homes in the country. The median home value in the LA metro area is $613,400,³ landing Irvine in fourth place on our list of metros with the most expensive homes.

If you hire a professional moving company, your local move can cost anywhere between $550–$2,000 if you get basic services. If you hire your movers for deluxe add-ons like piano moving, junk removal, or appliance hook up, your price can go even higher.

Additionally, this price range spans a wide spectrum of home sizes and move distances. Your exact price will be determined by several factors like how much stuff you’re moving, how many miles you’re moving, and the time of year.

Because moving prices are always unique to individual moves, it’s almost impossible to accurately predict how much your move will cost until you start getting real estimates from moving companies. Pro tip: get estimates from a few different movers if you want to find your cheapest option.

Read our guide to moving costs to learn more.