According to Chip Cutter in The Journal, he flies from Columbus to JFK Airport once a week. During this time, he stays in hotels and leaves spare clothes in the office. He has kept this up for more than a year. But even he does not know how much longer he can last.
“What began as a post-pandemic experiment of flying to and from New York each week has turned into what I am hesitant to call a lifestyle,” he wrote.
During the pandemic, Cutter moved back to Ohio, his home state. When his workplace asked him to start coming into its Manhattan office three days a week, he was “underwhelmed” by NYC properties he could afford. So he decided he would try becoming a so-called super-commuter.
“Using back-of-the-envelope math, I thought I could keep my expenses—rent in Ohio, plus travel costs—at or below the price of a nice New York studio, or roughly $3,200 a month,” Cutter wrote. “The challenge felt oddly thrilling.”
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Cutter is up by 4:15 a.m. on Mondays to catch a 6 a.m. flight. He can make it door-to-door in three hours if there are no unforeseen circumstances. At first, Cutter rapidly burned through his hotel-loyalty points by staying in luxury hotels.
He also “repeatedly” had to rebook flights. And stump up for an extra night in a hotel just to meet the demands of his work. To address this, he started looking for cheaper accommodation.
“Sometimes I sleep in a different New York City hotel room every night,” he wrote in the Journal article. “When hotel prices are high, I property-surf to find a lower rate.”
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According to him, hotel room prices fluctuate even on the check-in day. So, instead of booking in advance, he would wait until 10 p.m. some days after the rates fell. Other times, he holes up at friends’ apartments, too.
Despite those precautions, he ran low on air miles and blew his budget by 15%. “Working in a city without a permanent home took a toll,” he wrote. “I came to dread the go-to question asked at parties and work events in New York: ‘So where do you live?'”
Also, staying in hotel rooms without kitchen facilities means he has to rely on easy late-night dinners he can buy from a 24-hour store. And so he can travel light, he keeps a pair of shoes under his desk in the office and spare outfits on a coat rack.
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His sacrifices mean he gets to spend more time with family while avoiding New York rent. “It has been worth it,” Cutter said in an interview. He enjoys having one foot in the Midwest and one on the East Coast, but he constantly wonders how long it will last.
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