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0 pointsido5y ago0 comments

Heck, there are a lot of properties in Germany (where there are actually jobs) that would require less than €200k.

People here say these are remote but that is really mostly just how "spoiled" (in quotes because I'm "spoiled" that way too!) Germans are with commute. You can be 1 hour drive away (including traffic) from many fairly central places in Berlin & have very cheap housing outside the city (partially this is because traffic is actually not that bad in Berlin & partially because it's in the middle of an otherwise fairly empty & large plain[0]).

In comparison nowhere within reasonable 1 hour drive from central London is cheap, nor from SF/LA/NYC or heck even Tel Aviv.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_European_Plain

0 comments

zelos5y ago

> within reasonable 1 hour drive from central London is cheap

1hr drive from central London is probably still in central London, though ;-)

1hr train from London gets you to areas where a reasonable 3 bed semi is ~£300k I guess.

MagnumOpus5y ago

You'd be surprised. 1hr commute from London in reality is 40 minutes on the train (10 minutes walk either side, even getting out of a major train station takes that long). And 40 minutes ride from central London is Sevenoaks, Reading, St. Albans, and zone 6 commuter towns like Amersham or Borehamwood -- your 3-bed semi will still cost you half a million pounds if not much more. (Thanks to the NIMBY policy that designated dozens square miles of farms inside the M25 as "green belt" and dozens more as private golf courses...)

imtringued5y ago

Germany is a good choice. Very low cost of living relative to job opportunities.

amzans5y ago

Only if you rent or stay far away from the hotspots. Germany has one of the lowest home ownership rates recorded at 41%.

In Munich, an average <80m2 apartment 40+ minutes away from the city center costs around 640K EUR. And if you're looking at a decent detached house we're talking about a million at the very least.

Unfortunately doesn't add up when salaries in tech are 55-85k EUR, with net income somewhere around half of that.

But yes, outside of purchasing real estate, cost of living is pretty good relative to quality of life.

idoOP5y ago

Right but Munich is the worst in all of Germany, rather than a typical example. It's like quoting SFBA housing costs as an example for the US.

walrus015y ago

I would not say that 2 hours of driving every day is affordable, if you calculate the fully-loaded euros per km cost of owning, maintaining, fueling, insurance and operating a vehicle, how many km you would put on it every work week, and the cost of paying for parking in the urban center. 0.75 euro cents per km would not be an unreasonable figure.

ChuckNorris895y ago

>Heck, there are a lot of properties in Germany (where there are actually jobs) that would require less than €200k

Do you have any examples? I could never find anything larger than a matchbox in a village for under $200k in Germany.

Anything decent I found in the outskirts of any big city was over 500k.

idoOP5y ago

The first thing is to look in places without good transit as germans (reasonably!) prefer those. The moment it requires owning a car anything outside Berlin (so in Brandenburg) will be affordable.

Here's a quick search for houses under €100k with at least 100m^2 and 3 rooms (2BR) in Brandenburg: https://www.immobilienscout24.de/Suche/de/brandenburg/guenst...

It returns 83 results & while not all of them are within 1 hour drive from Berlin, at least a bunch of them are.

Also if you're in the affluent south or west of the country (which I suspect is where you searched?) you will have far fewer options for cheap housing than in the depopulated former East-Germany around Berlin. You definitely can't repeat this "trick" outside of Munich.

ChuckNorris895y ago

No offense, but those places are cheap because nobody wants to live there and for good reason. It looks much worse than Eastern Europe.

Nobody in their right mind would want their kids growing up there.

In family friendly places with jobs the properties are far from cheap.

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jacquesm5y ago

Near the Dutch German border there are plenty of houses that are affordable, well under 200K. Don't cross that border though, then prices will skyrocket.

melvinroest5y ago

Hey, are you up for chatting more about Berlin houses? I'm Dutch and my German is ... not too great. But I am mildly interested in it. So if you're up for it, my email is in my profile.

idoOP5y ago

does this reply answer your questions? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24198125

melvinroest5y ago

Hey, thanks, it does.

Why is the east side cheaper? I mean, I know it was occupied by the Soviet Union back in the day, but why is it still cheaper there now?

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zelos5y ago

> within reasonable 1 hour drive from central London is cheap

1hr drive from central London is probably still in central London, though ;-)

1hr train from London gets you to areas where a reasonable 3 bed semi is ~£300k I guess.

MagnumOpus5y ago

imtringued5y ago

Germany is a good choice. Very low cost of living relative to job opportunities.

amzans5y ago

Only if you rent or stay far away from the hotspots. Germany has one of the lowest home ownership rates recorded at 41%.

In Munich, an average <80m2 apartment 40+ minutes away from the city center costs around 640K EUR. And if you're looking at a decent detached house we're talking about a million at the very least.

Unfortunately doesn't add up when salaries in tech are 55-85k EUR, with net income somewhere around half of that.

But yes, outside of purchasing real estate, cost of living is pretty good relative to quality of life.

idoOP5y ago

Right but Munich is the worst in all of Germany, rather than a typical example. It's like quoting SFBA housing costs as an example for the US.

walrus015y ago

ChuckNorris895y ago

>Heck, there are a lot of properties in Germany (where there are actually jobs) that would require less than €200k

Do you have any examples? I could never find anything larger than a matchbox in a village for under $200k in Germany.

Anything decent I found in the outskirts of any big city was over 500k.

idoOP5y ago

The first thing is to look in places without good transit as germans (reasonably!) prefer those. The moment it requires owning a car anything outside Berlin (so in Brandenburg) will be affordable.

Here's a quick search for houses under €100k with at least 100m^2 and 3 rooms (2BR) in Brandenburg: https://www.immobilienscout24.de/Suche/de/brandenburg/guenst...

It returns 83 results & while not all of them are within 1 hour drive from Berlin, at least a bunch of them are.

ChuckNorris895y ago

No offense, but those places are cheap because nobody wants to live there and for good reason. It looks much worse than Eastern Europe.

Nobody in their right mind would want their kids growing up there.

In family friendly places with jobs the properties are far from cheap.

1 more reply

jacquesm5y ago

Near the Dutch German border there are plenty of houses that are affordable, well under 200K. Don't cross that border though, then prices will skyrocket.

melvinroest5y ago

Hey, are you up for chatting more about Berlin houses? I'm Dutch and my German is ... not too great. But I am mildly interested in it. So if you're up for it, my email is in my profile.

idoOP5y ago

does this reply answer your questions? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24198125

melvinroest5y ago

Hey, thanks, it does.

Why is the east side cheaper? I mean, I know it was occupied by the Soviet Union back in the day, but why is it still cheaper there now?

1 more reply

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse