How much would you need to make an hour to live in our cities and towns comfortably?
If it often feels like your hard-earned wages never stretch far enough, you might think it’s because you’re blowing your budget unnecessarily - but it could really be the cost of living in your city that’s behind your financial woes.
A new online tool that reveals how much money Britons should be earning in postcodes across the country to realistically live ‘comfortable’ lives may have the answer.
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Hide AdHighlighting the huge difference between the cheapest and most expensive areas, the online tool tells us that the cost of living comfortably in Britain varies dramatically from one postcode to another.
Wakefield residents can live a ‘comfortable life’ on earnings between £9.14 and £12.04 per hour, In Leeds it could be at the lower end of £9.90 for the Leeds 11 postcode or up to £24.17 for Leeds 16.
Folk in Pontefract would need to be bringing in £10.80, Featherstone £8.69 and in Hemsworth £8.44. Castleford is £9.56.
To live a comfortable life in Scarborogh you’d have to be earning around £8.88 and in Halifax, an hourly earning of about £10.82 would be needed.
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Hide AdThinking of a move to Harrogate? You’d need to be earning around £19.62.
In areas of Sheffield, you would need to bring in £10.48 in North Anston, going up to £26.57 for Crosspool.
Batley folk would need £8.74 and in Dewsbury around £9.92. Morley comes out at £10.82.
Pack your bags and relocate to the big smoke of London, however, and you’d need to be earning £54.54 per hour to live comfortably.
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Hide AdThe interactive widget, created by the team at www.web-blinds.com, analysed renting data from all 2,650 UK postcodes.
Users are asked to input the first half of a postcode or the name of a city and are then taken to a map of their chosen area that features a postcode-by-postcode breakdown of how much money they’d need to earn per hour to realistically live a ‘comfortable’ life, based on the recommendation from Shelter that rent should be no more than 35 per cent of tenant’s income.
Spokesperson for www.web-blinds.com, Kirsty O’Sullivan, said: “The most expensive postcodes and cities make for eye-watering reading, but there are still plenty of affordable gems out there for renters. They just might have to look outside of the capital for them.”
The interactive tool can be found here.