Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

Tasmania is legitimately one of the most beautiful place I've seen anywhere in the world. Bruny Island, Huon Valley, most of the East coast, Hobart itself... but you absolutely pay for the beauty with lack of amenities and convenience.

The entire state only has 500k people in it, and you feel it. Shops close early, and close multiple days a week to save staff costs. You have to buy most stuff online, and shipping takes a while longer than anywhere else (for obvious reasons). The internet is mostly fixed wireless, unless you're in the middle of Hobart. There's regular power and Internet outages. There's a lack of people-stuff, so very few meetups, and it's very hard to find friends.

Most my family are down there (chefs and farmers), and it absolutely suits the outdoors types. Fishing, boating, hiking, and photography are all just cheating down there.

But I wouldn't call it a hub for... anything. You're on an island, and it very much feels like it.

Without a doubt one of my absolute favourite places in Australia (and the world) to holiday though. It's in my top 5 "places people must see before they die" list.

If you want to go really small, Pullman WA is exactly what you're asking for. WSU and Schweitzer Engineering are the only shows in town (seriously) and the population is about 10k not including the students. We rented a 2-story, 4 bedroom house with a beautiful view of the entire town and almost 2 acres of lot for $1400/mo.

Wonderful schools, INCREDIBLY safe by any measure in the entire world, and lots of professors and engineer-types who have migrated there and found a home over all these years.

Now, the inevitable downside is that other than Moscow ID (~20k pop, another college town but with a little bit more "community") just over the border, there is nothing nearby. No, really, nothing. The few towns that are smattered about are 1000 people or less. The closest city is Spokane (~150k-ish pop?) and Spokane frankly sucks. Seattle is 5 hours away. If this doesn't bother you, and some snow and ice in the winter is fine, it's a good fit. Of course there is the lowest possible likelihood of finding a local job in software, but it is possible and I'm guessing from your post that this isn't a concern.

But yeah, I would 100% describe it as a low-cost place with a strong intellectual atmosphere.

Pune may have some tech companies. But nowhere close to Banglore. It's remotely hard to convince even an engineer living in Banglore to move to Pune because of the lack of tech companies compared to Banglore. How can you even recommend someone from SFO to move to Pune?

> Universiy of Pune? Symbiosis? They may not be IIT's or MIT's but they are better than a lot of other universities in India and in Asia

Even students in India won't go there until they can't make it to the top 20 - 25 Universities in India. Dude he lives in SFO which is the home of Stanford and University of California and has more nobel laurates than rest of Asia combined.

Come on man. I get you like Pune. But this is just a terrible advice. Pune doesn't have anything to justify a person moving all the way from SFO especially if they are a foreigner.

Thank you for the sane response.

Having lived in the worlds most liveable city, Melbourne, for several years, I have so far found Barcelona to be far more enjoyable. The thing that has stood out is that people actually care about their city and socio-political events that affect their lives.

I personally think the tourist issue is overhyped and most of them don't stray from the centre of the city.My local beach, Mar Bella which is only 1.5-2km from the city has zero tourists. Airbnb is a problem but this is a global phenomenon.

I came to the discussion to see if Portugal was mentioned, and was pleasantly surprised to see it as the top-ranked comment.

I will just add my suggestion of a another city to the mix: Aveiro. Small yet not too small, cheap, a short hop from Porto, 2hrs away from Lisbon, with trains and good highways, a very tech oriented university, excellent food, close by the sea and a huge lagoon good for all kinds of watersports.

I work for an US based company from here, and I used to live in Lisbon for 10+ years. Love Lisbon, but my quality of life here in Aveiro is so much better.