Cheapest Provinces of Canada to Live In

Which provinces of Canada are the cheapest to live in?

If you’re planning on moving to Canada, there are certain steps you should start taking. By the time you begin to process and secure your travel documents, you might also be left wondering which province to move to.

And yes, they are different. Each province has different resources and different opportunities. As a result, they have different costs of living as well. If you want to move to Canada and are worried about funds, then you need to know which provinces you will be able to afford living in.

Let’s start then. Here are the cheapest provinces of Canada you can move to.

Prince Edward Island

Prince Edward Island is the smallest province in Canada in terms of land area and population, although it’s the most densely populated. It is also one of the cheapest provinces especially when it comes to the price of housing, food, and even utilities. The capital city Charlottetown ranked as the sixth most affordable city in the whole country.

A one-bedroom flat in Charlottetown may cost about $550 (N178,536) a month, while a three-bedroom flat may cost around $800 (N259,651). In comparison, one- and three-bedroom flats in the major cities of other provinces cost between $1200-$2000 (N389,511 – N649,186) and $1600-$2800 (N519,349 – N908,800) respectively. These include cities like Toronto and Calgary,

If you’re interested in buying a house, a good family home in Prince Edward Island costs about $200,000 (N64,600,346). And if you choose to live in a rural area, you’ll pay even less.

Agriculture is the major economic activity in the province. An estimated total of 70% of the land is cultivated and 25% of all potatoes grown in Canada originate from P.E.I. Therefore, if you are agriculture inclined, then Prince Edward Island might be the right place for you. You can build yourself up slowly and steadily seeing as you don’t have to spend so much on rent or other living costs. As we said, food and other daily costs are much cheaper in the province than in a lot of other places.

However, there aren’t as many diverse job employment opportunities in Prince Edward Island as there are in some other major provinces like British Columbia, which is why immigrants prefer going there instead.

Nova Scotia

Next on our list is Nova Scotia, which also has some of the cheapest housing in the whole of Canada. Rent is generally 70% higher on average in places like Toronto, Ontario than in Halifax, the capital of Nova Scotia. The price per square meter to buy a property can be on average up to 90% more expensive in Toronto.

You can buy a three-bedroom house just outside the city of Halifax for around $200,000 (N64,600,346). In more rural areas of Nova Scotia, you can get the same kind of house for far less. Asides from rent, other costs such as food, entertainment and public transport are relatively low as well.

Just like any other smaller province, it is not as easy getting a job in Nova Scotia as it is in provinces like Ontario and British Columbia. That said, if you have education and experience in various job sectors, you can find a job. The employment rate is much the same as it is in many other parts of Europe or North America.

Alberta

Alberta is perhaps the fastest-growing province in Canada. A very prosperous province, it is also home to seven of the fifteen fastest-growing cities in Canada. This province shares so many of the advantages of more popular provinces like Ontario and British Columbia. It is certainly not as cheap to live there as it is in places like Prince Edward Island, but it’s still relatively affordable to live in Alberta.

For comparison, almost every aspect of living in Alberta is cheaper than living in Ontario (the most populous province, which contains the capital, Ottawa, and the largest city, Toronto). On average, the purchasing power in Ontario is 25% lower than that in Alberta. What this lower cost of living means is that a sum of money can purchase far more in Alberta than in Ontario.

Housing costs are also relatively low in Alberta. The average rent for a one-bedroom apartment in the province is $1070 (N345,907), whereas the average rent for the same sized apartment in Ontario is $1723 (N557,052).

Costs of transportation, food, entertainment, and even taxes are also lower in Alberta than they are in places like Ontario and British Columbia.

New Brunswick

Just like Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia, New Brunswick has a low population. Only about 760,000 people live there. It also has a low population density, meaning that the low population is not packed together.

Without a doubt, New Brunswick is one of the cheapest provinces of Canada to live in. The average price of a house in New Brunswick is around $150,000 (N48,477,578). This is why many newcomers to the province are able to quickly buy their own houses. Other essentials are also quite cheap. Utilities like water, gas and electricity are much cheaper in New Brunswick than in other provinces of Canada. The food is cheaper there too.

However, the downside is that New Brunswick does not have such a good job market. Thus, if your priority is to get a job, especially a skilled job for graduates, then this province might not be the best for you. Originally, much of the workforce in the region relied mostly on fishing and agriculture. But as overfishing and changes in agriculture occurred, massive unemployment followed, forcing more people to move out in search of better opportunities elsewhere.

The Government of Canada has been making attempts to revive New Brunswick, especially with investments in the financial and insurance industries. Many companies are moving their customer service and technical support call centres to this region, so the information technology areas have been growing. This could eventually lead to an increase in employment in the near future.