Canada Most Expensive Cities

Posted on by Forest in Cheapest Places To Live, Saving Money & Finances

Canada Most Expensive Cities – Earlier this year the Mercer Worldwide Cost of Living Survey 2011 looked at cities across the world from a general cost of living perspective. In this article we’ll see which cities they picked as the most expensive in Canada.

Canada Most Expensive Cities

The Mercer report is generally created for the interest of corporations looking to send expats to new cities for work so gathers an average cost of living cost covering rental or buying a home, how much food costs, entertainment, fuel and driving costs and much more. They base themselves on a standard New York cost of living and are rooted from a US perspective which means that Canadian cities have overall jumped up a lot this year due to the changes in the US$ and CA$.

According to the report here are the top 5 most expensive Canadian cities ranked by The Mercer Cost of Living Report 2011.

Toronto – (ranked 59 out of 214 overall)
Vancouver - (ranked 65 out of 214 overall)
Montreal - (ranked 79 out of 214 overall)
Calgary - (ranked 96 out of 214 overall)
Ottawa - (ranked 114 out of 214 overall)

I only have experience myself of living in Montreal and I find it pretty affordable but things like eating out and bars can be expensive. Transport is pretty affordable and you can walk most places and groceries are cheap as long as you shop in smaller more hidden places. I’ve always imagined Toronto would be expensive to live in but even that is sitting down in 59th spot, way below many cities in Europe and some in the USA.

Canada Most Expensive Cities to Buy a Home In

Ignoring the overall data WalletPop published a slideshow showing the top ten most expensive cities to buy a home in Canada using data from October 2010 from the Canadian Real Estate Association. Here they are below, with the average house price.

Vancouver – $707,207
Victoria – $506,777
Toronto – $443,633
Ottawa – $341,517
Edmonton – $317,096
Kitchener – Waterloo – $308,004
Hamilton – $293,929
Saskatoon – $293,929
Regina – $257,032

3 out of 5 cities are shared in the top 5 so it could be said that there is something to be said for a correlation between home prices and cost of living. Of course that would need a lot more research to be said as concrete.

Do you live in any of the cities mentioned and if so how do you find the costs are there? Do wages meet the costs or is everyone struggling to get by?

I look forward to your comments.