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

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

#391

Post by spdionis »

C1sc0cat wrote: post #351
nelsonic wrote: post #229

Depending on your ability to work remotely, I would make the "case" that you should consider Portugal . Lisbon and Porto are super popular with ["digital nomad"] remote workers who work for international companies so earn in USD but spend [much less] in Euros for a superb lifestyle. There's a reason @paddycosgrave moved Web Summit to Lisbon. It's one of the cheapest cities in Europe and [unlike Barcelona] everyone sp…

Not sure you will get sv salary in dollars working in Portugal :-) having said that I got pitched a 100K (euros) Job in Portugal a couple of months ago so it looks like tech skills are in short supply

The GP is talking about remote work.

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

#393

Post by bogomipz »

nelsonic wrote: post #229

Depending on your ability to work remotely, I would make the "case" that you should consider Portugal . Lisbon and Porto are super popular with ["digital nomad"] remote workers who work for international companies so earn in USD but spend [much less] in Euros for a superb lifestyle. There's a reason @paddycosgrave moved Web Summit to Lisbon. It's one of the cheapest cities in Europe and [unlike Barcelona] everyone sp…

>"Portugal is very welcoming to US citizens, you won't have any "visa issues" the way you will in many of the [superficially] "cheaper" Asian countries."

Can you elaborate on this? Wouldn't a U.S citizen still be limited to only 90 days in the Shengen zone every 180 days? Or is there some type of freelance visa?

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

#394

Post by iopuy »

quantummkv wrote: post #201

Have you considered Pune in India? The area has an excellent tech scene with both established companies and startups. It has excellent universities and the area has a lot of students and institutions. Everyone knows English in here. The area itself is has lots of beautiful places around for trekking and exploring if you are into that sort of thing, especially in the monsoon season. And it's cheap. Really cheap. For 2…

Do I have anything to worry about in Pune as a female engineer? I read about Pune on the net and it sounds nice, just want to make sure the community (tech and other) are as accepting as SFO. Thanks for the suggestion. Cheers!

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

#395

Post by sonnyblarney »

enjoyitasus wrote: post #359
sonnyblarney wrote: post #189

In North America I would vote Montreal. It's 1/2 price of most American cities and 2x funner and cooler than almost any of them. LA and NYC have tons of cool, but they are expensive and doing fun stuff is generally expensive. Not so Montreal. Mtl has way more going on than even SF ever had back in the day, and it's much bigger than Austin, Boulder/Colorado Springs etc. etc.. During the summer, Montreal has an unbelie…

I would agree. Montreal has relatively good infrastructure and also good housing options for families and singles alike. It’s small compared to these tier 1 cities in Western Europe but it’s great, people are nice and are bilingual. The winters are extremely cold but if you don’t mind that it’s fine. Not sure about the salaries but I hear they are lower but so is the cost of living.

"It’s small compared to these tier 1 cities in Western Europe"

Only London and Paris are much bigger.

Mtl is about 4 million people, it's almost the same size as Madrid or Berlin or Barca. A little smaller than Amsterdam but really bigger than most else.

But it's tier 2 size in North America, but a strong tier 2.

It's really weird how people in NA don't know about Montreal. It kills most places for culture.

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

#396

Post by [deleted] »

sanedigital wrote: post #343
santialbo wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and [unlike Barcelona] everyone speaks English Do you have any stats proving that? Just asked a portuguese friend living in Barcelona and said that is a quite bold statement.

I'd second this. Almost everyone in professional circles speaks English in Barcelona. I would say on average Portugal has much better English penetration than Spain, but Barcelona is definitely an exception.

[deleted]

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

#397

Post by chrisper »

stagas wrote: post #101
mikeloden wrote: post #52

Zürich

12-15 euro for a kebab. They must be seasoning everything with gold there. But it's a nice city if you manage to live there and its expensiveness works generally as a quality filter so most people are educated and smart.

Salaries are quite high though.

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

#398

Post by HelloNurse »

MrQuincle wrote: post #143
techcode wrote: post #107

I can wholeheartedly recommend Amsterdam (or surrounding places). Everyone speaks English, pay is good, and work-life balance makes a lot of difference. Commutes are generally short, you get ~26 paid holidays per year (sick leave is separate from that)...

A lot of cities in the Netherlands are easy to reach by public transport. Car is also fine. Pay is of course lower than in the Bay area. Culture wise it's sometimes hard to make friends with the Dutch. It depends on how you spend your spare time. Playing a sport, going to parties, going to group lessons in a gym, etc. is essential to make Dutch friends later in life.

> A lot of cities in the Netherlands are easy to reach by public transport. Easy to reach and very close to each other.

In particular, the Schiphol airport also has a major train station; it's very close to Amsterdam and Haarlem, but suitable for most of western Netherlands.

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

#399

Post by sonnyblarney »

blocked_again wrote: post #384
sonnyblarney wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are an American it's trivial if you have a technical degree. You get a TN visa at the border and can renew for up to 6 years.

I am not an American.

It's probably easier than moving to the US, it's a points system, much easier if you have a job and a technical degree, but not trivial either. We have quite a lot of immigration.

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

#400

Post by mclightning »

dvlsg wrote: post #158
fastbeef wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cost of housing / income ratio in Stockholm is so out of whack that it’s basically impossible to enter the housing market without at least €50k-75k in savings to have as a down payment for an apartment anywhere nice.

Thats disappointing. After visiting, I found I really enjoyed both Sweden and Norway, and wouldn't mind moving there someday. Sounds like that may be difficult.

Who wants to live in Stockholm anyway? Malmö is much better connected to Europe. You can basically drive to Germany, You can fly anywhere from Copenhagen which is 20 minutes train ride away from Malmö. Copenhagen airport has a lot more flights than Stockholm.

That said, you get advantage of being right next to Copenhagen. It is a big market of jobs there. Salaries are high because it is a big, crowded city with high living expenses. So you could live in Malmö for cheap and commute to Copenhagen for work.

All that said, as a 26 year old, I managed to take a gap year in Malmö now, after working/saving for 4 years, while managing to keep paying my mortgage, owning a car etc.

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