21-year-old flies 600 miles a week to avoid paying $3,500-a-month New York rent—here's how much she saves
Sophia Celentano's work commute starts in the middle of the night.
Her alarm goes off at 3:30 am, reminding the 21-year-old that she has less than an hour to start driving to Charleston International Airport — otherwise, she'll miss her flight to the office.
Since early June, Celentano has commuted by plane once a week to her summer internship at Ogilvy Health in Parsippany, New Jersey, from her parent's house in Charleston, South Carolina.
Celentano didn't want to join the legions of summer interns fighting for affordable housing in and around New York City. And her job only requires her to be in the office — about a 45-minute drive from downtown Manhattan — once, sometimes twice, per week.
For Celentano, commuting four-plus hours by plane weekly was a much easier pill to swallow than paying New York rent for three months on an intern's salary.
"I didn't think twice about it," Celentano, a rising senior at the University of Virginia, tells CNBC Make It.
Super-commuting, which the Census Bureau loosely defines as traveling "long distances" by air, rail, car or bus to work — usually 90 minutes or more each way — has become more popular since the Covid-19 pandemic hit. Companies adopted hybrid work models, and people fled major cities.
Even some college students are on board. "I really wanted to prioritize my happiness and well-being this summer, and to do that, I wanted to mostly be in Charleston with my family," says Celentano.
The intern's super-commuting routine helps her save thousands of dollars, too. Here's how.
A hassle worth $2,000 in savings
When Celentano first received her internship offer in the spring, she compared the cost of renting an apartment in Parsippany or New York for the summer, versus living with her parents and taking a weekly round-trip budget flight.
The average apartment rent in Parsippany is about $1,730 per month for a studio, and closer to $3,500 in New York, according to data from Apartments.com and Renthop. That doesn't include utilities, groceries, gas and other expenses Celentano would need to cover for the summer. She declined to share how much she earns at her internship.
All in all, Celentano estimates she would spend a minimum of $4,250 to live and work near Ogilvy Health's office between June and August, if she was lucky enough to find an apartment for less than $1,000 per month.
That seemed ridiculous: Her job only required her to be in the office on Wednesdays, plus occasional one-off events like an intern orientation.
In contrast, Celentano's super-commute costs her about $225 per week, including a round-trip flight from Charleston to Newark Liberty International Airport, Ubers between the airport and her office, and food.
Every Wednesday at 6 a.m., she boards a $27 departing flight, according to receipts reviewed by CNBC Make It. Her return flight at 9 p.m. costs about $60. She packs breakfast and dinner in her work bag to save money.
Celentano's internship is 10 weeks long. She'll spend about $2,250, saving at least $2,000 this summer — or $200 per week — she estimates.
Super-commuting instead of moving for 'healthier work-life balance'
The hardest part of Celentano's super-commute is getting home around 11 p.m. She works remotely on Thursdays and can sleep in until at least 8 a.m., easing the sting of her long travel days.
Two weeks in, Celentano says her commute cuts out "a lot of the stress" she might otherwise experience, living far from her family and friends. She posted a TikTok video about it on her first day of work. Hours later, it had more than 500,000 views.
She's posted several follow-up videos on TikTok about her super-commuting routine, explaining her bosses' responses — they don't mind, she says — and how she kills time in the airport by editing vlogs for her YouTube channel.
Celentano's super-commute isn't even a rare occurrence in her internship program, she adds: Some of her peers travel from Boston or Philadelphia, and one even flies in from Atlanta.
"Obviously, moving to a new city can be exciting, and it's great to push yourself outside of your comfort zone, but that kind of change is not what I was craving in my life right now," says Celentano. "I'm grateful to have found an employer that supports that. Ironically, having a longer commute has helped me have a healthier work-life balance."
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