Newindpress

Chennai, Jun 20: This city has something in common with Moscow, London, Seoul, Tokyo, Hong Kong and Copenhagen — a place among the most expensive cities in the world.

For the first time, Chennai has also overtaken Bangalore in terms of cost of living.

According to Mercer’s Annual Cost of Living Survey 2007, conducted by the HR consulting firm, Chennai has been ranked 133 while Bangalore is 134. This survey is often used as a benchmark by companies and governments to fix expat compensation packages.

Growth of IT and industrial investments, soaring real estate prices, abundance of high-income residents, and a rapidly emerging retail scene has put Chennai on a trajectory of becoming dearer in the coming years.

However, the city lags behind Mumbai (ranked 52nd) and Delhi (ranked 68th) in the Mercer list. Though the city is at the bottom of the pile, realtors say that in terms of land price and housing cost Chennai is surging ahead.

Sohail Sarooshi of Real Estate Agents Association said that the real estate rates were very high when compared to Bangalore but the prices had started to stabilise over the couple of months.