South Carolina TikToker Saves on Rent by Flying to Work in New Jersey

• A South Carolina woman has a life hack for saving on rent: She flies to her workplace in New Jersey.
• Sophia Celentano is an intern at Ogilvy Health, where she goes into the office once a week.
• Celentano said on Linkedin that her flights are cheaper than “paying $3400+ a month for rent.” 

A TikToker from South Carolina went viral after she revealed that she saves on rent by catching flights to her workplace in New Jersey. 

Sophia Celentano, a media studies major at the University of Virginia, is interning with Ogilvy Health this summer, and commuting to the office by plane. Celentano helps manage the company’s social media accounts, per her LinkedIn profile.

“Because I only have to be in the office one day a week, obviously it is cheaper for me to stay at home in Charleston for this summer with my parents, and just pay for plane tickets one day a week than to live, like, in New York full time,” said Celentano in a TikTok video posted on June 6. 

Celentano said in her TikTok video that on the days she has to commute, she wakes up at 3 a.m. to fly in to Newark Airport. She then has an hour to get ready to leave at 4 a.m. for her flight.

According to Celentano, she usually goes to work only on Wednesdays, and manages to touch down at Newark at around 8 a.m., ahead of her 9 a.m. call time at the office. 

Celentano elaborated on her commute in a Thursday LinkedIn post, breaking down the comparative cost of flying versus renting in New Jersey. Instead of forking out “$3400+ a month for rent (the new average for leases in Manhattan)”, she now only spends $100 a week on flights for the one day she works on-site.

That means Celentano spends around $400 a month for flight expenses — amounting to savings of thousands of dollars, per her summary of her travel expenses. 

Celentano’s video has, at press time, been viewed more than 582,000 times. And some social media users have commended Celentano for thinking of this life hack. 

“$400 vs $3400? There’s a no-brainer there,” said a user named Samah K. on LinkedIn. 

According to a report by the listing portal Rent, Jersey City was one of the most expensive cities to rent an apartment from in the US last year, coming in second after New York. 

Celentano and a representative for Ogilvy Health did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider sent outside regular business hours.