Manhattan and Brooklyn No Bargain for Residents

The data has been analyzed and the news could have been predicted; Manhattan and Brooklyn top the list of most expensive places to live in the United States.

Coming out in first and second places on the Cost of Living Index compiled by the Council for Community and Economic Research were Manhattan and Brooklyn, in that order. Not far from them on the list, Queens took sixth place.

The council examined the cost of living in 300 US cities based on the prices of 60 basic consumer goods and services such as groceries, housing, health, utilities and transportation. As the costliest city in the country to live, Manhattan’s cost is more than double the average with an index number of 233.5 percent. Brooklyn’s index is 183.4 percent of the national average, and Queens is 151.4 percent.

The top ten most expensive cities tend to repeat each year, according to Dean Frutiger, the project manager for the Cost of Living Index project at C2ER.

'The top 10 most expensive cities are pretty stable, they remain almost static, there’s more change at the bottom,” Frutiger said.

Those looking for less expensive digs could try moving to Texas where four of the cheapest ten cities to live in America are located, the most affordable being Harlingen, Texas at only 81.6 percent of the national average.