Let’s say you’re young, beautiful, underemployed and, well, morally “flexible.” Where might you go to meet a rich older man willing to put you on an allowance in exchange for, say, looking the other way when he mentions his wife? San Francisco.
The city by the bay has more sugar daddies per capita than any other place in the U.S., with 3.5 older men seeking such relationships with younger women per 1,000 residents, says Brandon Wade, chief executive of a site called SeekingArrangement.com. That far exceeds the number of sugar daddies in the second-ranked city, Boston, which has a ratio of 2.47.
But what exactly is a sugar daddy? According to Wade, whose site compiled five years of data, they’re guys ranging in age from 39 to 44; earning an average of $265,000, with assets of $5.6 million. About 41% are married. They spend an average of $4,357 per month keeping a mistress, usually about 12 years his junior, in the style to which she expects to become accustomed.
Wade attributes the unusually high Sugar Daddy rate in San Franciso to newly-rich geeks looking for love. “There’s a lot of new wealth from the likes of Facebook, Google and Apple,” says Wade. “And now that they have made it they are ready to start dating.”
Why wouldn’t a rich man date in the normal way – or frequent a site that doesn’t appear as exploitive, like, say, eHarmony?
It’s a matter of odds, according to Wade. On a normal dating site, there are more men than women. On a Sugar Daddy site, there are 10 times as many women as men. In other words, a geeky guy can get a hot chick, (assuming he doesn’t mind bankrolling her) on a site like this. On an ordinary dating site, the women might have jobs, pride and, well become offended by someone who offered to buy them.
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Wade stresses that this is not prostitution. It differs because prostitutes sell themselves by the hour. These are long-term relationships, where you might actually develop some feeling for one another.
Not offended and just want to know where to go to find a wealthy man to “keep” you?
Then realize there are two ways to look for a Sugar Daddy – you can go for volume by moving to the city where there are more Sugar Daddies per capita; or you can seek a sponsor in a city where they’re more likely to be generous.
Even though San Francisco has lots of Sugar Daddies, they don’t even show up in the top 20 for generosity – i.e. the amount they lay out for their lovers. The most generous Sugar Daddies live in Los Angeles, where “allowances” top $5,700 per month.
Here are the 20 top cities for most generous Sugar Daddies, followed by the cities where there are the most Sugar Daddies per capita.
10 Cities with the most generous Sugar Daddies (based on monthly allowance):
Los Angeles: $5,710
New York: $5,002
Seattle: $4,985
Miami: $4,927
Louisville, Kentucky: $4,860
Las Vegas: $4,773
Phoenix: $4,625
Salt Lake City: 4,563
Columbus, Ohio: $4,423
Buffalo, New York: $4,293
10 cities with the most Sugar Daddies (per 1,000 residents):
San Francisco: Density, 3.51. Monthly allowance: $3,765
Boston: Density, 2.47. Monthly allowance: $4,111.
Austin, Texas: Density, 2.35. Monthly allowance: $3,647
Las Vegas: Density, 2.32. Monthly allowance: $4,773
Los Angeles: Density, 2.31. Monthly allowance: $5,710
Washington, D.C.: Density, 2.24. Monthly allowance: $3,913
Hartford, Connecticut: Density, 2.21. Monthly allowance: $4,095
Miami: Density, 2.14. Monthly allowance: $4,927
New York: Density, 2.10. Monthly allowance: $4,991
San Diego, California: Density, 1.85. Monthly allowance: $4,043
I would like to see you drill down on cost of living differences. Great article.
Good point, Karen. If you’re looking at cost-of-living vs. allowance, I bet the best place to be a “kept” woman would probably be Phoenix, where you’d spend a lot less of your allowance on dull things like rent. (Sure, Vegas, too…but then you’d have to contend with all those prostitutes, who (oddly) might be considered competition for a sugar baby.