Naval Sub Base Kings Bay BAH Rates 2026

How BAH Is Calculated Here

The rate comes from a survey of St. Marys and Kingsland rents, sorted into six housing profiles with average utilities added, one profile per paygrade.

Median, not ceiling — half the qualifying homes in Camden County cost more. Rises mid-tour, never falls.

The interesting question at Kings Bay is why the rate is as high as it is for a county of fifty thousand people, and the answer explains the rest of this page. Camden County sits at the northern edge of the Jacksonville commuter shed. The rental survey picks up a market that is partly priced by Florida commuters and partly by the submarine base, which is why an E-5 here draws more than the same sailor would at Cherry Point or Moody.

The problem is that the sale market reads the same signal, and reads it harder. BAH tracks rents; purchase prices in Camden have run ahead of rents, so a rate that looks generous against other small markets still lands well short of the local median home. That gap is the whole story below.

One more thing to check before you budget anything. Coastal Camden County is flood country. St. Marys is tidal, flood-zone designations here vary street by street, and an NFIP policy is a separate cost from the homeowners insurance in the table — often a large one. Pull the flood determination on the specific parcel, not the neighborhood.

What BAH Actually Covers at Naval Sub Base Kings Bay

Camden County BAH is generous for a town of nineteen thousand — an E-5 with dependents draws $2,133, more than the same sailor would draw at Cherry Point or Moody. Camden sits at the top of the Jacksonville commuter shed, and the survey picks that up.

Local prices picked it up too, and then some.

The median St. Marys home sold for $346,000 (Redfin), at $190 a square foot — higher than Norfolk, Clarksville or El Paso. At 0% down, 6.77% on a thirty-year VA loan with the funding fee financed:

	Monthly
Principal & interest	$2,297
Property tax (Camden County, 1.11%)	$320
Homeowners insurance	$192
Total	$2,809

Against BAH with dependents:

Rank	BAH	Covers the payment?
E-4	$2,016	Short $793
E-5	$2,133	Short $676
E-6	$2,157	Short $652
E-7	$2,250	Short $559
O-3	$2,418	Short $391

Nobody clears it. An E-7 with dependents — a chief, mid-career — still covers roughly $560 a month out of pocket to own the median home here.

Camden also carries the highest property tax rate of the Georgia and Carolina markets in this guide at 1.11%, which adds $320 a month on its own. And the insurance figure above is a Georgia state average; St. Marys is tidal coastal Georgia and Redfin flags major flood risk here, so a flood policy is a real additional cost that is not included in the $192. Get a quote on the specific address before you budget.

How It Compares

A three-bedroom rents for about $1,791 in St. Marys (Zillow), against $2,809 to own the median home. Owning costs more than a thousand dollars a month extra — and that is before the roughly $288 a month that 1% annual maintenance adds on a house this size.

On the model used across this site, buying does not pass renting until about month 149 — roughly twelve and a half years. A shore tour at Kings Bay is typically three. The arithmetic is unambiguous: buying the median home here and selling at the end of a normal tour loses money, and it is not close.

The exit is slow too. Homes sat 95 days on market at last reading, up from 59 a year earlier, and Redfin rates the market as not competitive with multiple offers rare. If orders arrive and you need to sell, plan on months, not weeks.

None of which means do not buy — it means do not buy the median. The price where BAH covers the whole payment is $256,610 for an E-5 and $259,783 for an E-6, roughly 25% below the median. Those houses exist in Camden County, more often in Kingsland than in historic St. Marys. Buying at that price changes every number on this page.

The other play worth knowing: Camden's rental market is tight enough, and BAH high enough, that keeping the house and renting it to the next sailor is a real option instead of selling into a 95-day market. That is what second-tier entitlement is for — it lets you keep this house and still use a VA loan at your next duty station.

Run your rank and a real listing through the BAH calculator before you decide either way.