The most expensive cities to spend summer in: bad news for Londoners

Updated
london sep 20 view of oxford...
london sep 20 view of oxford...



A new study has revealed the most expensive cities to spend this summer in. There's bad news for Londoners: the city is the fourth most expensive in the world. It's enough to make Brits consider checking out the competition, and trying to get a few months' work somewhere else for the summer.

According to researchers from Expatistan, the cost-of-living database, Zurich is the top of the list, followed by Geneva, Grand Cayman, London, and Bern - so clearly Switzerland is out of the question for bargain-hunters.

Much of the US is prohibitively pricey too, with Washington in sixth place, San Francisco in seventh and New York in eighth. Outside the top ten there's also Chicago in 12th place, Boston 14th, Honolulu in 18th and San Jose in 20th.

The big global trade centres - where anyone working for a big business might try to arrange an overseas assignment - aren't much use to you either. Hong Kong is in ninth place, Singapore in tenth, and Sydney in 15th.
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English-speaking destinations also feature high up the expensive list - including Melbourne in 16th place and Perth in 17th.

The UK

The only other UK city to make the top twenty is Aberdeen, so the answer to cutting your costs may not be to trek to the other side of the world, but to consider moving to alternative locations in the UK. The researchers gave London a global index score of 293, compared to Edinburgh which got 197, Manchester 188, Glasgow 186, Belfast 173, and Nottingham 160, so a strategic move could slice 40% off your living costs.

Cheapest

If you're willing to try something a bit more extreme, the study also revealed the cheapest places to spend your summer. The cheapest place of all is in Bhagyanagar in India (with an index of 53), and the country is also home to many of the top twenty cheapest places to spend this summer - including Madras, Pune, Bangalore, Delhi and Gurgaon.

If you weren't planning to travel so far afield there are some European options, including Chişinău in Moldova (which is second-cheapest place to live in the world), Novi Sad in Serbia in sixth, Vilnius in Lithuania in seventh, Cluj-Napoca in Romania in eighth, and Debrecen in Hungary in tenth.

And if you're looking for international travel somewhere familiar in Western Europe - which is still significantly cheaper than the cheapest UK city in the study - there's bags to choose from, including Berlin, Barcelona, Madrid, and Lisbon.

But what do you think? Would you prefer any of these places for your summer - or would you rather pay far more for London life? Let us know in the comments.

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