Top 10 most expensive and cheapest cities for expats revealed

With the cost of living continuing to skyrocket in Australia, you might be tempted to pack up and move overseas to work. But new research has revealed Australia’s biggest capital cities are actually much more affordable compared to other global giants for expats.

The latest Mercer Cost of Living global index has analysed the cost of moving to various cities around the world for work. That included looking at comparative costs of more than 200 items including housing, food, clothing, goods and entertainment.

While no Aussie cities ranked in the top 50 most expensive for expats, Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne did make it into the top 100. Sydney was named the most expensive city for workers in the Pacific region.

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The most expensive cities for expats were Hong Kong, Singapore and Zurich. Factors like expensive housing markets, high transport costs and the higher cost of goods and services all contributed to high living costs.

Three other Swiss cities made the top 10 list (Geneva, Basel and Bern), while London climbed up the rankings by nine places this year to land at number 8 on the list. New York also made the top 10, coming in at number 7.

On the other end of the scale, Lagos and Abuja in Nigeria were named the least expensive cities for expats to move to, thanks in part to currency depreciations. Havana in Cuba also made the top 10 least expensive cities.

World’s most expensive cities for expats

1. Hong Kong

2. Singapore,

3. Zurich, Switzerland

4. Geneva, Switzerland

5. Basel, Switzerland

6. Bern, Switzerland

7. New York, USA

8. London, UK

9. Nassau, The Bahamas

10. Los Angeles, USA

World’s least expensive cities for expats

1. Havana, Cuba

2. Windhoek, Namibia

3. Durban, South Africa

4. Dushanbe, Tajikistan

5. Blantyre, Malawi

6. Karachi, Pakistan

7. Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan

8. Islamabad, Pakistan

9. Lagos, Nigeria

10. Abuja, Nigeria

Story continues

Sydney most expensive city in Pacific

While Sydney did not rank highly on the global list, it was the most expensive city in the Pacific region coming in 58th place.

Scottish expat Kimberley Lucas moved to Sydney with her young family in April last year and told Yahoo Finance the cost of living was much more expensive compared to back home. Glasgow was ranked as being cheaper for expats, coming in 68th place.

Lucas said she’s found rent much more expensive in Sydney, with her family initially forking out $1,200 a week for rent. Their second biggest expense was childcare, costing $160 to $170 for each of her two young kids.

“I definitely think there’s this view that if you move to Australia everything’s easy and everything just gets better, and that is absolutely not true,” Lucas said.

The 32-year-old and her family have since moved to the Central Coast. It is more affordable but Lucas said they are still paying $750 a week to rent a house.

According to the rankings, Sydney is more expensive for expats than popular cities like Barcelona, Spain (66), Rome, Italy (67), Buenos Aires, Argentina (77) and Lisbon, Portugal (100).

The second most expensive city in the Pacific region was Noumea, New Caledonia (60), followed by Melbourne (73) and Brisbane (89).

Across the ditch, New Zealand’s Auckland and Wellington remained the least expensive Pacific locations, coming in 111th and 145th respectively.

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