Top 5 Gay-Friendly Places in Canada to Retire | Queer Money Ep. 590

So, David. Yes. What are the best cities in Canada for gay people retiring? I don't know. Let's find out. This is Queer Money, episode 590. And today we are kicking off or finally taking the steps you've been asking us to do. And that's do the gay city series globally. We're going to start with Trump's biggest enemy, our friends

to the north. Oh, Canada. Yeah. Pretty bad enemies to have. Yeah, whatever. So we're going to dive right in. City number five out of five is Windsor, Ontario, Canada. Now, why is Windsor a great place for LGBTQ retirees? Well, Windsor offers a unique blend of affordability, it's cultural richness. It's also really close to the US Border. And as. As we know. Yep. And as Canada's southernmost city, it boasts the mildest winters of other Canadian locations. So remember, for all those cold bitches.

Those who can't handle the cold, this. Is Canada and there's nothing we can do about. And we're going to visit multiple countries, so we're going to visit some more warmer countries sooner. So I don't know why we, we decided to go with Canada. And first because it might be where we have to escape if things go south in the U.S. yeah. We also do know people who have retired to Canada. So it's not exclusively a place where retirees avoid. So why, what are some downsides to Windsor?

Well, it doesn't offer the same level of LGBTQ night life as many or cultural events as many other large Canadian cities. It also has limited public transportation, so you may need a car and that can add to your cost. So it's not the most vibrant city, but it does have a very welcoming and inclusive atmosphere for the LGBT community there. There are, there are active LGBTQ organizations providing support for the community and engagement for them.

Annual pride events celebrating diversity and inclusion. And it's also just over the river to Detroit. And we know Detroit is full of cultural and social opportunities for the queer community, especially in Ferndale, which is a suburb of Detroit. It is basically gay mecca in place you love. Yeah. As far as the cost of living here, you're looking at Windsor, the price of a two bedroom place coming in around 12001220 US dollars.

Overall cost of living, it's about 5 to 10% lower than the Canadian national average, which is about 14% lower than Detroit. And we know that Detroit is one of the cheapest big cities in the United States. And we are coming up with a new rating system how we are going to rate all of these Cities that we're going to be looking at when we're covering all these different countries. And we're calling this the Queer Money Retirement rating, and

it's how we rank these cities. We'll share with you a little bit more about that later. But in this particular case, Windsor gets an eight and a half out of 10. Love it. Coming in at number four is Calgary. So one of the reasons why Calgary is on this list is because it has no provincial sales tax. So it's a great way to keep your cost of living lower. It also has easy access to the Rocky Mountain region.

So if you are into snowboarding, skiing, snowshoeing, snowshoeing, all those snow things like ice fish, ice fishing, sleighs, reindeer, Santa Clauses, all that kind of stuff, this has your. This is maybe ideal for you. It has access to modern amenities and it has a very strong and thriving economy. The one downside is that it's conservative relative to the rest of Canada. But we have to remember that conservative in Canada is not the same thing as conservative here.

So take that with a grain of salt. Historically, it's considered conservative. It's also cold and it has drier winters. All that said, surprisingly, has a very vibrant queer community and strong pride presence. So you're not completely alone if you're an LGBTQ person and you don't have to necessarily hide yourself while you're there. It has inclusive healthcare resources, queer arts and community centers. The two bedroom apartment goes for $1,435 on average per month, and that's US dollars.

The overall cost of living is about 8.3% lower than the US national average. So you do get a bit of a savings there as well. And the Queer Money rating for the Queer Money retirement rating for this is 8 out of 10. So why are we doing this? What are we doing this? So a little bit of a prelude to what's going to be coming up. David and I are sort of transitioning into a more of a retirement phase of our lives.

And so we're kind of figuring out where it is that we want to go, what we want to do next. So couple that with the fact that we did the Gay City series, the domestic edition, a couple years ago, and many people kept asking for us to go globally. We decided to be. To finally do it. So that's what we're doing. Obviously, this week we're doing Canada. Let us know in the comments if there are any particular countries that you want to visit. We want to make sure that this is useful for you.

And of course, let us know if you've been to any of these cities that made this particular list for Canada. Let us know what your thoughts are if you think that we have missed any particular cities. And in two weeks we'll be doing Spain, so look out for that coming soon. So how did we come up with our rating system or what are we focused on? Well, in this particular episode we're focusing a little bit more on affordable cities, which will sometimes, but not always.

But in this case, it does exclude some of the biggest cities in, in Canada. Cities like Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal. They're some of the most expensive cities. As a matter of fact, we watched something the other day. A 650 square foot, one bedroom condo in Toronto is going for $750,000 and that's with a price drop recently. So not necessarily optimal for retirees. Right. It's a very expensive. Those cities are very expensive. They're very densely populated. They have a very strong urban core.

But that oftentimes includes things like traffic and high cost of living and they attract younger professionals, which that may not be your thing as a retiree. So we wanted to focus a little bit more on things that

retirees generally seem to be interested in, things like affordability, healthcare access, LGBTQ inclusiveness as well as quality of life, all the important stuff. So coming in, in third place is Halifax. This Halifax has the coastal charm, it's got slower pace of life, has access to good health care, also has access to very affordable housing. The downside is that because it's on the coast, the coast comes with water and it can be very wet and sometimes a very windy climate.

So we have to remember that is Canada. It is Canada. It is known, however, as Eastern Canada's queer hub. So it's very inclusive, it has a very strong Pride festival every year, has inclusive healthcare services, particularly for LGBTQ people, and has a tight knit community there. Two bedroom, the average two bedroom rent goes for eighteen hundred dollars. Eighteen hundred dollars a month in US dollars.

The overall cost of living is about fourteen and a half percent lower than the US national average. So this, I think if I remember correctly, this cheapest location that we have on this particular list. Yeah. As far as overall cost of living, I think housing

is a little, was a little bit cheaper in, in one of the previous cities. Right. And so this gets a queer money retirement rating of 8 and a half out of 10 stars, fractions there. Coming in at number two is Victoria in British Columbia. It is the mildest climate of the cities. That we're looking at partly because it's a coastal area. So it has beautiful coastal scenery, it has a walkable downtown and excellent healthcare.

Downside here is that real estate prices are amongst the highest on this particular list. Not as high as some of those other places, those big cities that we mentioned earlier. It is a very active, does have a very active, artsy, progressive and inclusive culture there and it is for that reason is a very attractive place for the queer community. Active pride events, it's queer friendly cafes and large, a large retiree population. Lots of gays mean lots of dollars. Right.

And so that's kind of interesting. It's a place that is actually attracting a number of the Canadian retirees. So, you know, we, we birds of feather like to together. Right. So we're going to find the cost of living. Right. And so here cost of living is a little bit higher. A two bedroom, two bathroom is going to cost you around 20002020 US dollars a month.

Overall cost of living is coming in just under the U.S. average, which in this case it's 910 of 1% lower than the U.S. the queer money retirement rating on this location though, because it is so welcoming to the queer community and is retirement focused, is a 9 out of 10. So if any of these cities ring familiar to you, you know we're covering Canada this week. In two weeks we'll be covering Spain.

Share in the comments however though, which countries you want us to visit and let us know what your thoughts are on the cities that we're covering

here in Canada. If you like this episode, give us a like set notifications and share it with other friends of yours who also want to retire abroad. And so hopefully we can get this information out to more LGBTQ people. So David, coming in at number one, who's our first winner on this particular list? Ottawa. So Ottawa is known as Canada's capital with a great healthcare, lots of green space. It's also a bilingual city because it is the capital city. The downside here, Ottawa.

Bring your parka cold. Right. So this is probably a city where you may want to think about being a snowbird. Right. Spend your summer months or the spring, summer and fall in Ottawa and then head south to some beach or tropical area. We'll be covering Mexico in about a month. So maybe we just go back and forth between Canada and Mexico and you just live in the countries that Trump hates. Exactly. Some of the great things about here is it is politically progressive and very welcoming.

It does have a diverse queer population. It also hosts the annual Capital Pride and has multiple drag shows going on. The nice thing here is the cost of living is a little bit cheaper than the United States. A two bedroom, two bathroom is coming in around $1800 a month and that's less than the US US average two bedroom, two bathroom is around 1900. So you've got, you

have a little bit of savings there. Overall cost of living is about eight, eight and a half percent lower than the U.S. average. So we give the Queer Money rating here of a 9 out of 10.

So for the Queer Money rating retirement card that we're going to continue to build out as we go from country to country to country, if you want access to that in our scoring criteria, the metrics that we use to come up with the rating, please go to queermoneypodcast.com cities remember to share in the comments which countries you want us to visit next. Let us know what your particular thoughts are for this lister in Canada.

And then if you're not watching on YouTube, remember you can always DM us on Instagram or TikTok and let us know your thoughts, questions and anything else. So if you love this episode, please give us a like subscribe and share it with your friends who also want to maybe retire abroad. And until next time, stay fabulous.