What Physical Therapists earn in Strafford County, NH
If you are weighing a move or a job offer, start with $103,550: the median annual pay for Physical Therapists in Strafford County, NH. Spread over a standard 2,080-hour work year, that is $49.78 an hour. Because the wage survey covers the whole Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH metropolitan area, the number reflects employers across the region rather than a single town or a single company.
The mean wage is $106,830, which is 3.2% above the median, a sign that a group of high earners lifts the average. The survey counts about 5,330 people working in this occupation across the Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH metropolitan area, so the estimate rests on a substantial pool of workers. Strafford County, NH has roughly 132,575 residents, according to the population figures used by the rent data.
The salary range, from entry level to top earners
Pay for Physical Therapists in the Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH metropolitan area is not one number. The lowest-paid tenth of workers earn up to $81,220 a year ($39.05 an hour), while the highest-paid tenth earn $130,220 or more ($62.61 an hour). That is a gap of $49,000 between the bottom and the top of the scale. The middle half of workers falls between $94,750 at the 25th percentile and $122,380 at the 75th percentile. A top-tier earner makes 1.6 times what someone at the bottom makes, so experience, certification and employer all matter.
What the hourly rate looks like
Converted to an hourly wage, the median for Physical Therapists in Strafford County, NH is $49.78. A full-time schedule of 40 hours for 52 weeks adds up to $103,550, and the same salary is $8,629 a month before taxes or about $3,983 per biweekly pay period. After taxes the same job pays $39.13 per hour of take-home income, which is the number that actually has to cover rent and groceries.
About this occupation: Physical Therapists
The U.S. Department of Labor's O*NET database describes the work of Physical Therapists this way: "Assess, plan, organize, and participate in rehabilitative programs that improve mobility, relieve pain, increase strength, and improve or correct disabling conditions resulting from disease or injury."
Core tasks recorded by O*NET include: "Plan, prepare, or carry out individually designed programs of physical treatment to maintain, improve, or restore physical functioning, alleviate pain, or prevent physical dysfunction in patients"; "Perform and document an initial exam, evaluating data to identify problems and determine a diagnosis prior to intervention"; "Evaluate effects of treatment at various stages and adjust treatments to achieve maximum benefit"; "Administer manual exercises, massage, or traction to help relieve pain, increase patient strength, or decrease or prevent deformity or crippling".
Job outlook for Physical Therapists
The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects national employment in this occupation to grow from 283,700 jobs in 2025 to 317,600 in 2035, a change of +11.9%, faster than the 3.5% projected for all occupations. The projection counts 13,400 openings a year on average, including positions created by growth and positions left by workers who retire or move to another occupation; that equals 4.7% of current employment each year.
Typical entry-level education: doctoral or professional degree. BLS lists a national median annual wage of $102,760 for this occupation; the Strafford County, NH median of $103,550 is 0.8% above it.
How pay in Strafford County, NH compares
Compared with the New Hampshire average
Pay for Physical Therapists in Strafford County, NH is in line with the statewide figure: $103,550 locally against an employment-weighted New Hampshire average of $102,995, a difference of only $555 (0.5%). Within New Hampshire, Strafford County, NH already has the highest median we track for this job.
Compared with the national average
Nationally, Physical Therapists earn an employment-weighted average of $104,199 across the contiguous United States, so $103,550 in Strafford County, NH is essentially average. Keep in mind that a higher salary only helps if living costs do not rise faster, which is why the cost sections below matter as much as the headline number.
Where this job ranks in Strafford County, NH
Among the 581 occupations with published wages in Strafford County, NH, Physical Therapists ranks number 136 by median pay, ahead of about 77% of them. The best-paying occupation we track here is Natural Sciences Managers at $291,000 a year, which is $187,450 more than the median for Physical Therapists.
From gross pay to take-home pay
A salary of $103,550 does not arrive in full. We model a single filer with wage income only, the standard deduction and tax-year 2025 rules, and we keep the three tax layers apart: federal income tax, FICA (Social Security and Medicare) and state income tax. Together they take $22,152 a year, which leaves $81,398, or $6,783 a month.
Put another way, of every $100 earned, about $21 goes to taxes and $79 reaches the paycheck. The overall effective tax rate is 21.4%.
Federal income tax
After the $15,750 standard deduction, taxable income is $87,800. Federal brackets are marginal, so only the slice of income above each threshold is taxed at the higher rate; the last dollars of this salary fall in the 22% bracket. The resulting federal income tax is $14,230, an effective 13.7% of gross pay, well below the 22% marginal rate because the lower brackets are cheaper.
Social Security and Medicare (FICA)
Payroll taxes are a flat percentage of wages. Social Security takes 6.2% up to a wage base of $176,100, which costs $6,420 on this salary. Medicare takes 1.45%, or $1,501. FICA totals $7,922, which is 7.7% of gross pay.
State income tax in New Hampshire
There is no state income tax on wages in New Hampshire, which means Physical Therapists in Strafford County, NH keep the full $81,398 left after federal and payroll taxes. For scale, a hypothetical flat 5% state tax on this salary would cost about $5,178 a year, so the absence of a state tax is worth roughly $431 a month.
A cross-check with IRS data for Strafford County, NH
IRS Statistics of Income data for Strafford County, NH show an average adjusted gross income of $92,275 per return and an average effective federal income tax rate of 13.1% across all filers. Filers in the $100,000 to under $200,000 bracket, where this salary falls, paid an average of 11.5%, compared with the 13.7% estimated here for a single filer taking the standard deduction. Gaps between the two reflect filing status, dependents, credits and other income, none of which a single-person wage estimate includes.
Cost of living in Strafford County, NH
Take-home pay only means something next to what life costs. We price four basics for one adult in Strafford County, NH: a one-bedroom apartment, food, home energy and gasoline. All of them are converted to annual figures first, then compared with the $81,398 of take-home pay.
Rent
The HUD Fair Market Rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Strafford County, NH is $1,600 a month, or $19,200 a year. A two-bedroom costs $2,093 a month. For Physical Therapists, a one-bedroom absorbs 23.6% of take-home pay and 18.5% of gross pay.
Food
The USDA Thrifty Food Plan (August 2026) puts the cost of a nutritious home-cooked diet for an adult at about $3,436 a year, which is $286 a month or $66.07 a week. That equals 3.3% of gross pay for Physical Therapists in Strafford County, NH. It is a thrifty budget with no restaurant meals, so treat it as a floor.
Energy and gasoline
Using New Hampshire residential prices from the Energy Information Administration and national household averages for consumption, electricity costs about $2,473 a year and other home energy such as natural gas about $737, for $3,210 in total. Gasoline in New Hampshire averages $3.25 per gallon; at about 463 gallons a year (11,106 miles at 24 miles per gallon) fuel adds $1,505.
What is left over
Add the four basics together and living costs come to $27,350 a year, 34% of take-home pay. That leaves $54,048 a year, or $4,504 a month, for savings, transportation beyond fuel, health care, debt and everything else. That margin equals 52.2% of gross pay, a comfortable cushion by common budgeting rules.
Local housing and commute data for Strafford County, NH
The budget above covers rent, food, energy and gasoline. Three more local facts shape what a paycheck buys in Strafford County, NH: property taxes, housing prices and the daily commute. The figures below are exact U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey 2020-2024 5-year estimates for Strafford County, NH, set beside the New Hampshire and national medians.
Property taxes in Strafford County, NH
Homeowners in Strafford County, NH pay a median of $6,708 a year in real estate taxes, in line with the New Hampshire median of $6,667 and 115% above the U.S. median of $3,119. Against a median home value of $362,800, the median tax bill is 1.85% of that value (the ratio of the two county medians). For a worker paid the local Physical Therapists median of $103,550, a tax bill of that size would equal 6.5% of gross pay, which matters for anyone planning to buy rather than rent.
Rents, home prices and household income in Strafford County, NH
Renters in Strafford County, NH pay a median gross rent of $1,488 a month in the Census survey, in line with the New Hampshire median of $1,491. HUD's Fair Market Rent for a one-bedroom apartment, which this site uses in the budget, is $1,600 a month; the two measures differ because the Census figure covers units of every size that renters already occupy, while the HUD figure is a one-bedroom benchmark. The median value of an owner-occupied home is $362,800, 10% below the New Hampshire median of $402,500. Median household income is $88,570, 11% below the New Hampshire median of $99,031, so a year of one-bedroom Fair Market Rent equals 21.7% of that income.
Commuting in Strafford County, NH
Workers in Strafford County, NH who travel to a workplace spend an average of 26.0 minutes each way, 3% below the New Hampshire average of 26.7. For someone who commutes five days a week, that is 4.3 hours of round-trip travel every week, a cost the budget does not price. 16.2% of workers in Strafford County, NH work from home, compared with 15.1% nationally, which removes the commute for them.
Can Physical Therapists afford to live in Strafford County, NH?
The 30% rent guideline
A common rule of thumb says rent should stay under 30% of gross income. For a gross salary of $103,550 that ceiling is $2,589 a month. The one-bedroom Fair Market Rent of $1,600 is $989 under it, so rent fits the guideline. Put as a wage, covering a one-bedroom at the 30% guideline takes $30.77 an hour; the median for Physical Therapists is $49.78, which is 62% above that mark. Another way to see it: at $39.13 of take-home pay an hour, a one-bedroom takes about 9.4 working hours every week.
Splitting a two-bedroom
Sharing a two-bedroom at $2,093 a month means $1,047 each. Compared with renting a one-bedroom alone, that saves $6,642 a year. With a roommate, the yearly margin after the basics becomes $60,690.
How fast you can save
At $4,504 a month of margin, building a $10,000 emergency fund would take about 3 months. Setting aside half of the margin stretches the same goal to about 6 months. These figures ignore interest, raises and any spending beyond the four basics.
Frequently asked questions about Physical Therapists pay in Strafford County, NH
What is the hourly wage for Physical Therapists in Strafford County, NH?
The median is $49.78 per hour, based on $103,550 a year over 2,080 hours. Hourly pay runs from about $39.05 at the 10th percentile to $62.61 at the 90th percentile.
What is the take-home pay for Physical Therapists in Strafford County, NH?
After federal income tax, FICA, the median salary of $103,550 becomes $81,398 a year. That is $6,783 a month, $3,131 every two weeks or $1,565 a week.
What percentage of pay goes to taxes for Physical Therapists in Strafford County, NH?
Total taxes are $22,152 a year, an effective rate of 21.4%: $14,230 federal income tax, $7,922 FICA and no New Hampshire income tax.
Is pay for Physical Therapists in Strafford County, NH above the New Hampshire average?
It is about the same. The local median of $103,550 is within 0.5% of the New Hampshire average of $102,995.
Is a one-bedroom rent affordable on the median Physical Therapists salary in Strafford County, NH?
A one-bedroom costs $1,600 a month against take-home pay of $6,783, which is 23.6% of take-home pay. That meets the 30%-of-gross guideline, which allows up to $2,589 a month.
How much is left after rent, food and energy for Physical Therapists in Strafford County, NH?
About $4,504 a month ($54,048 a year) remains after a one-bedroom apartment, food, home energy and gasoline, which together cost $27,350 a year.
What hourly wage covers a one-bedroom in Strafford County, NH at the 30% guideline?
$30.77 an hour for a full-time schedule, calculated as the $19,200 annual rent divided by 0.30 and by 2,080 hours. The median for Physical Therapists is $49.78.
How we calculated these numbers
Wages are May 2025 medians from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey for the Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH metropolitan area; hourly-only values are annualized at 2,080 hours. Rents are HUD Fair Market Rents, food costs come from the USDA Thrifty Food Plan, and energy prices come from the Energy Information Administration. County-level tax statistics come from the IRS Statistics of Income.
Taxes use tax-year 2025 federal brackets, FICA rates and the New Hampshire rules for a single filer with wage income only. Figures are estimates for planning and comparison, not tax or financial advice, and they exclude local income taxes, benefits, retirement contributions and individual circumstances.