Published Nov 13, 2003
HannahRN24
24 Posts
Hey all!!:roll
I am currently living in Louisiana. I will graduate as an RN in May 2004 and would love to start my nursing career in Florida!! My main question is what kind of money do nurses make in Florida? I have been unable to get any sort of idea off the internet. What are pay ranges and starting wages for new RN's?? Any info would be greatly appreciated!! Thanks!
kcarberry
3 Posts
Hi! I am currently an RN student in Pensacola, Florida. A classmate of mine recently called to the area hospitals and was dissapointed as most paid less than $20 an hour. You can always look for websites for Florida hospitals and give their HR dept a call. They will usually tell you what the pay is. Hope this helps some.
Kristy
Tweety, BSN, RN
35,406 Posts
I think we are paying about 20-22 per hour. Starting salaries have significantly gone up the last 10 years and are still rising.
PHM
97 Posts
Tweetie . . .and you are where in FL?
Starting here is $15, in Tallhassee is $16, but I heard in Tampa with 6 mos experience you can expect around $25.
Thanks,
Phil
giftedRN
310 Posts
$16 in Tallahassee? that sounds low but at least the cost of living in Tallahassee is far lower than others like west palm beach, boca raton, just to mention a few. I guess I will have to live in Tallahassee at least for years before having plans to move.
Ann
debx
27 Posts
I think new grads start around $17-18ish/hr in the Daytona Beach area.
A few years back I could say that the cost of living was low here. However, housing has really sky rocketed over the last few years.
Hope this helps.
The salary quotes I posted for the panhandle area are from an employment seminar (about 7 or 8 hospitals in the panhandle area of FL, AL, lower GA) we just had at our nursing school (I'll graduate in May).
I was shocked with Tallahassee's starting salary as T isn't as inexpensive as it once was. Apartments may still be pretty reasonable but housing costs are skyrocketing.
Here in Panama City, costs are also going thru the roof. My house insurance,including the FL hurricane premium and flood insurance easily exceeds $1100/yr which is about double what I was paying 7 or 8 years ago.
That said, the main advantage I've seen with our area is that crime is almost nil. Serious crime is isolated to certain areas but outside of that there's very very little.
cherylr819
I have over 8 years of critical care, ER experience. I just moved to Tampa and am only making 21 and change! I'm at a hospital also.
sjoe
2,099 Posts
A few months ago I rummaged around on the State of Florida's official website and followed several links that led me to learn that the average RN salary in Florida is just under $18/hr. I doubt that the average salary has increased substantially since that time.
http://www.salary.com is also a web site you can use to investigate pay scales all over the nation.
poki
What???? $16, or less than 20. NEVER..NO NO.. With nursing
shortage hospitals should be paying more. If you go PRN that's much more. In South FLA average is with min experience around 23 full time employee.
In Crestview.. PRN pays around 26 I heard when I worked over there.
Hi Poki
Original post in this thread was for a beginning RN working in Florida. Wages I posted earlier for the panhandle were for just that . . . a newly grad'd RN as noted in the HR literature from local panhandle hospitals. Of course, PRN, no benefits, nights, weekends, overtime all can add to the "basic" salary. My neighbor is an RN with about 10 yrs and she's making about $27 as a PRN in the same hospital I work at.
Agree the shortage is bad. Our hospital went to PR to recruit new nurses. Standard patient/nurse load around here seems to be 5-7 per nurse.
Happy holidays,
Here is a link to current RN job openings across the state of Florida. As you can see, many of them start at just over $24,000/year.
http://www.myflorida.com/owa_jobs/owa/www_cv.jobvac.browse?pregion=SW&pocc_group=PROFESSIONAL+HEALTH+CARE&pminsal=10000&pagency=All+Agencies&psort=agency_abbr
That works out to around $12/hour to start. Which is why the average salary is still below $18/hour.
If interested, you can apply for RN positions from that site.