Hong Kong Archives - Luxury Home Digest

Want to Live in a Most Expensive City?

Roberta Murphy Thompson — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 04:01:12 +0000

Luxury Apartment

Ah… the luxury of being able to comfortably live in one of the most expensive cities in the world (so why not divide one’s time between them–just for bragging rights?:-)

CNBC just released their 10 most expensive cities in the world to live where they included 200 factors such as costs for a 2-bedroom luxury apartment, utilities, transportation, food, clothing, entertainment and so on.

It might come as no surprise that three of the top 10 are in Japan, two are in Switzerland and two in Africa.

So, without boring our readers with details, we cut to the chase, offer the cities in descending order and include the expected monthly rent for a luxury 2-bedroom apartment plus cost of a fast meal and a cup of coffee:

Tokyo, Japan where rent runs $4848, a cup of coffee $8.29 and fast-food meal $8.29
Luanda, Angola where monthly rent runs $6500, a cup of coffee a bargain at $3.90 and a fast food meal for around $19.94
Osaka, Japan offers the luxury apartment at $3062, a cup of coffee at $7.02 and the fast-food meal at $8.29.
Moscow, Russia has their luxury apartment at $4200, with cup of coffee at $8.37 and the fast-food meal at $6.70. (And how about an international newspaper at $9.78?)
Geneva, Switzerland presents the luxury apartment at $4818, with cup of coffee at $6.57 and the fast food meal at a whopping $12.59.
Zurich, Switzerland (compare to Geneva) offers a comparable apartment at $3614, a cup of coffee at $6.02, and a fast food meal at $12.59.
Singpore might offer luxury digs at $3588, a cup of coffee for $5.18 and a fast food meal for $5.66
N’Djamena, Chad …just doesn’t seem to have much in the way of luxury 2-bedroom apartments for expatriates. But should you find a place to live, you’ll pay $3.32 for a cup of coffee and an outrageous sum of $25.18 for a fast-food meal. Personal safety and OIL are big issues here.
Hong Kong offers a very pricey (but comparable) apartment for $7092 per month, the cup of coffee at $6.83–with a bargain fast food meal at $3.54.
Nagoya, Japan has the bargain luxury apartment at $2551 per month, the cup of coffee at $6.38 and the fast food meal at $8.42

Sitting in San Diego, I feel as if we are living in paradise at bargain basement prices.

Another cup of coffee, please?

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Most Expensive Cities in the World

Roberta Murphy — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 01:31:40 +0000

by Roberta Murphy

It’s interesting to study living costs in the most expensive cities in the world–at least as tabulated for 2009. According to Mercers, who tabulate these statistics for expatriate living, the 10 most expensive cities (based on housing, food, entertainment, clothing and transportation) are:

1. Tokyo

2. Osaka

3. Moscow

4. Geneva

5. Hong Kong

6. Zurich

7. Copenhagen

8. New York

9. Beijing

10. Singapore

Mercer’s, in their studies for expatriate cost of living, tabulates these costs for 143 cities in 65 continents and published their results each year. New York is used ars the base city and is given a score of 100. Using that base, Tokyo, for example, scores 143.7 and is almost three times as expensive as Johannesburg, which has an index of 49.6 and is one of the most reasonable places to live.

The top 5 most expensive cities in the Americas are New York City (8), Caracas, Venezuela (15), Los Angeles (23) White Plains (31) and San Francisco (34), while Asia and Europe dominate the worldly top ten list.

Now, we await the Mercer;s Most Expensive Cities list for 2010–especially in light of volatile currency swings.

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Hong Kong Luxury Real Estate on a Roll

Roberta Murphy — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 17:46:18 +0000

by Scott Murphy

$57 Million as a sales price for a Hong Kong apartment?

That’s a price that would make the most expensive areas around the world such as San Diego, Los Angeles, New York and even London cringe. This five-bedroom, 6158 square foot luxury duplex suite located at one of Hong Kong’s most prestigious addresses was bought by an unidentified Chinese buyer.

And if you think that is really high for an apartment like this, another recently sold in the same building for $51 million as well.

Created and crafted by one of Hong Kong’s major development companies, this is reported to be Hong Kong’s most expensive residential real estate sale–at a mind blowing $9,200 per square foot. This building also has many amenities such as an aroma spa center, fitness room, outdoor yoga gym and amazing views of the harbor.

That is an amount that most people cannot even imagine. No matter how hard-working or how dedicated to the saving, wise spending and money management encouraged by Forbes.com, lovemoney.com and the like, most people will not accumulate that kind of wealth–even in several lifetimes. It is most definitely the realm of the super rich, being able to purchase such colossally expensive homes–and the ultra-wealthy in Hong Kong are no exception.

There have been many fears of a bubble in China’s real estate economy, but lately the rich have been getting richer. There are now 130 billionaires in China and the number is expected to rise with all the money being poured into their economy.

There is also talk from Hong Kong’s leader Donald Tsang about freeing up more land for development to help add supply and bring down the prices to make housing more affordable.

What if I had $57 million to buy a luxury home in the U.S.?

I would seriously have to consider a currently-available 10,000 square foot home right on the beach in Del Mar, just north of La Jolla. The climate couldn’t be more perfect, the views are spectacular, while snow-covered mountains and desert golf are just a couple of hours away. But then again, I am a big fan of (and a Realtor for) homes in San Diego!

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