LAST YEAR The Economist created the Carrie Bradshaw index, a measure of the affordability of renting alone in America’s largest cities, simply because the star of “Intercourse and the Metropolis” managed to do in New York. This 12 months we despatched Carrie to Europe, looking for a brand new journey and, maybe, a greater deal on lease.
Our European rating contains the 35 cities for which the information can be found, starting from London to Ankara. Utilizing a well-liked guideline that states that not more than 30% of a person’s pre-tax earnings must be spent on lease, we calculated the wage wanted to comfortably afford the typical one-bedroom flat in every metropolis, what we name our “really helpful renters’ wage” (see chart 1).
At over $95,000 (all incomes are given in {dollars}, for ease of comparability), London and Geneva require the best annual incomes for solo renters. In each cities lower than 1% of residential housing is unoccupied: tight markets make for top costs. On the backside of our rating is Ankara, Turkey’s capital, the place an earnings of lower than $18,000 is sufficient to dwell alone.
However incomes range considerably throughout the continent. To search out out the place a one-bedroom condominium lies inside attain for the typical earner, we developed the “Bradshaw rating”. This compares our really helpful renters’ wage with the typical wage in every metropolis, utilizing knowledge from the ERI Financial Analysis Institute, a pay aggregator. The upper the rating, the extra reasonably priced it’s to lease alone.
By this measure Budapest is the priciest metropolis for would-be renters. Hungary had the best inflation price of any EU nation for a lot of 2023; rental prices within the capital elevated by 19% from 2022. Portugal’s capital additionally has one of many greatest rent-wage gaps in our index. Rents have soared in Lisbon after an inflow of “digital nomads”, tech staff lured by sunny climate and low-cost visas. (ERI knowledge is predicated on the place you’re employed, not the place you reside, to account for commuters.) The common wage of $31,000 is roughly half the $58,000 now wanted to afford a one-bed. Renting alone in each cities is nearly as troublesome as it’s in New York, relative to common wages.
A number of the most reasonably priced cities are in Germany. In Bonn the typical wage of $53,000 comfortably surpasses the $36,000 wanted to lease alone, giving it the best Bradshaw rating in our index. Berlin, the German capital and residential to very large protests in opposition to lease rises lately, and Karlsruhe, within the south-west, additionally rating above 1.
Aspiring Carries hoping to make it nearer to Paris, Europe’s trend capital, may accept Lyon, one in every of France’s culinary hotspots. The common wage of $45,000 is considerably above the $34,000 wanted for a one-bedroom. Nice information for Carrie—if she will be able to abdomen the tablier de sapeur.■
