A study shows that the Vogtland district is the most affordable place to live in Germany. Residents there have to pay 9.5 percent less than the German average for the cost of living, including housing costs, according to a recent study by the Institute of the German Economy (IW) in Cologne and the Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development (BBSR) in Bonn. Likewise favorably it lives itself in Görlitz (9,4 per cent).
Saxon far most expensively is the life in the state capital Dresden. There, the cost of living is still just below the German average (minus 0.6). In Leipzig, life is 3.6 percent cheaper than the national average.
Also in Saxony, housing costs make the big difference between living expensively and cheaply. In many other areas of the cost of living, on the other hand, there are no or only minor regional differences.
The calculations are based on around 24 million data, some of which were automatically read in 2022. According to the study, it is particularly expensive in large metropolitan areas such as Munich and the counties surrounding them, as well as in particularly popular residential areas, for example on the edge of the Alps or Lake Constance.
In contrast, the eastern federal states - with the exception of Berlin and the surrounding area - are usually significantly cheaper than average. Even if incomes in eastern Germany are lower in some cases, people there have a cost advantage over many large cities, it said.
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