Hello,

My boyfriend and I are considering renting an apartment in Granada for a couple of months. We have been before and fell in love.  We met people there who were renting a big 2 or 3 BR apartment right in the middle of the old town for really cheap like 450EU per month. Is that normal? All the stuff online looks really inflated.

How cheaply do you think we can actually live in Granada? Tell me about the cost of a decent 1-BR apartment in a central location (old city), something not super posh, but a livable size (like 200 meters sq), and not moldy.

Also, I seem to remember groceries and things being pretty inexpensive. But just tell me the price of a gallon of milk in the store and a box of corn flakes, a pound of fresh coffee and a whole raw chicken.  (or if you have some other measure you think I might find useful as a way to gage cost of living, use that).

Primary question, is can we live fairly comfortably as 2 people on $1800 USD per month. That’s about EU1350 per month.

Thanks.

I haven’t been to Granada, but that sounds like it could just get you by if you found something cheap. 200 metres sq is pretty huge by the way.

Hi;
I think these two links

http://granadainfo.com/english.htm
and
http://www.pisos.com/alquiler_viviendas/granada/ (all in Spanish I’m afraid but fairly self explanatory; rent =alquilar, apartment piso flat house= vivienda in this instance.

will go someway to answering your questions.

I live in a small village about 25Kms from Granada and do a weekly regular shopping trip there. The main supermarkets are Carrefour and Alcampo, both reasonably priced. Can’t speak for fresh coffee but a 200gm jar of a decent Nescafe instant is around 5 euros about 6.60 USD. Milk comes in 3 varieties, Desnata, semidesnata and Entero being skimmed, semiskimmed and whole. For the most part all milk is UHT long life and costs about 0.87 Euros or 1.15USD per litre.
For the most part grocery costs are I believe probably on a par with the US.

Public transport is cheap with buses costing a flat 1 euro any distance within the town.

Trains serve Madrid, Almeria and Seville direct from Granada again at reasonable rates although Madrid is rather more expensive because the service uses the high speed AVE line from Cordoba.  It is virtually impossible to reach the Costa del Sol resorts by train from Granada; far better, cheaper and easier to use the ALSA coach service to Malaga. I believe it is possible for US students to obtain a Special Railcard in advance.

See seat61.com for details of European rail travel including Spain.

See alsa.es for details of coach services from Granada to other parts of Spain.

Generally flights from the US go to Madrid or Barcelona; connecting flights come into Granada from both airports. It’s then a 3 euro / 4 USD coach trip into the city or about 20-25 USD by taxi.

I would say it is possible to have a reasonable life on 1350 Euros; just try to keep your rental costs down, but be prepared to have to put up a deposit of maybe two months in advance and don’t expect to be able to eat out every night!

If I can be of any help please let me know either by pm or this forum.

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Another thought occurred to me; if you or your boyfriend are at Uni in the States it might be worth contacting your admin to make enquiries about visiting Granada. Granada has a huge Uni complex scattered across the city and there might well be accommodation available during the Summer recess.
Heres a link to Granada Uni just in case you think it might help….

http://www.ugr.es/en/pages/universidad?lang=en

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Another factoid for you…

As pointed out by The Expatriator 200m/sq is huge being a square with each side measuring 200 metres…somewhat bigger than the White House Ground floor…!

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Apts size in Granada tends to be 60-80 sq meters, 100 would be a build from around the mid 1980’s, usually a 3 bedroom.

200 sq would be well into top end villa etc and would be exclusive.

Granada is still a pretty cheap area, but the rentals can be high in winter due to the Sierra Nevada ski resort, it gets pretty busy, but its a lovely area.

I wouldn’t live there without a pool, gets pretty damn hot in summer.