Best Cities for single renters
Whether you’re looking for love or happily single, finding a place to live on your own can be expensive if you’re going solo. With our new research, discover which cities are the most- and least- affordable for single renters in 2022.
Kingston upon Hull
East Riding of Yorkshire
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Avg Monthly Rent£519.40
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Most typical salary
(After Tax)£24,901 -
Weekly Groceries£33
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Utilities£110.38
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Money left over:£1,412.30
Sheffield
South Yorkshire
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Avg Monthly Rent£651.60
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Most typical salary
(After Tax)£26,132 -
Weekly Groceries£34
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Utilities£157.62
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Money left over:£1,334.45
Sunderland
Tyne and Wear
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Avg Monthly Rent£517.45
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Most typical salary
(After Tax)£23,859 -
Weekly Groceries£31
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Utilities£142.26
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Money left over:£1,297.54
Most affordable
Yorkshire holds two of the top three spots for the most affordable cities with Kingston upon Hull having the lowest cost of living and Sheffield being second. The North vs South divide in affordability is even more evident with Sunderland coming in third place. Single renters are left with more than £1,000 in all three places once utilities, rent and groceries are taken out of their salary.
London
London
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Avg Monthly Rent£3,443.20
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Most typical salary
(After Tax)£34,494 -
Weekly Groceries£39
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Utilities£205.92
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Money left over:-£813.62
Southend-on-Sea
Essex
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Avg Monthly Rent£1,789
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Most typical salary
(After Tax)£26,169 -
Weekly Groceries£37
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Utilities£220
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Money left over:£134.75
Poole
Dorset
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Avg Monthly Rent£1,764.50
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Most typical salary
(After Tax)£24,792 -
Weekly Groceries£28
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Utilities£134.31
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Money left over:£139.19
Most expensive
Despite receiving a higher average salary than every other city in the UK, London takes the top spot as the most expensive place for people planning to live alone. Due to excessive rental prices, our research has revealed that Londoners are left with -£813.62 of their monthly salary once utilities, groceries and rent are taken out. Things aren’t much better in Southend On Sea and Poole either with renters being left with less than £150 a month once the cost of living is taken into consideration.
Methodology
To discover where in the UK is the most affordable for single renters, we gathered data from online property listings and pulled the average rent for the largest cities across the UK.
We then looked at the average salary after tax from payscale.co.uk, price of groceries from numbeo.com and cost of utilities from numbeo.com to calculate how much the average outgoings would be for a single renter in all of these locations.
Once we knew what the average outgoings were for each city we subtracted that from the income to see how much money the average renter would be left with.
Full results
