Bored of your salary being swallowed up by your rent? It may be time to move to Durham.

The city has been named the most affordable place to rent in England, with just 23% of your monthly salary going towards rent there. Other northern cities closely follow in the latest Affordability Index, with tenants in Lancaster and Liverpool having to spend just 24% of their salary on rent.

At the other end of the scale, Brighton and Bath have been crowned the most expensive cities for renters, where you’ll will be expected to spend 52% of your salary on rental payments. These are closely followed by Oxford, where you will, on average, spend 51% of your salary towards rent.

Westminster and the City of London also make the ‘most expensive’ list – but surprisingly they don’t actually top it for percentage of salary spent (perhaps because while London rents are high, London salaries are often weighted).

The research, conducted by Open Property Group, used data on salaries from the Office for National Statistics to analyse the affordability of rent in 49 cities. The findings are based on a single tenant renting in each city. If the tenant was found to be spending over 30% of their gross income salary towards rent, this was deemed as ‘unaffordable’. 

The most affordable places to rent in England:

Durham – average rent £493, average salary £25,18 (23% on rent)

Liverpool – average rent £499, average salary £25,165 (24% on rent)

Lancaster – average rent £555, average salary £27,394 (24% on rent)

Hull – average rent £427, average salary £20,801 (25% on rent)

Stoke-on-Trent – average rent £481, average salary £23,160 (25% on rent)

Bradford – average rent £530, average salary £24,055 (26% on rent)

Carlisle – average rent £478, average salary £21,942 (26% on rent)

Sunderland – average rent £528, average salary £23,933 (26% on rent)

Chester – average rent £643, average salary £28,880 (27% on rent)

Preston – average rent £547, average salary £24,380 (27% on rent)

Newcastle upon Tyne –average rent £618, average salary £26,703 (27% on rent)

Sheffield – average rent £600, average salary £25,330 (28% on rent)

Salford – average rent £578, average salary £24,719 (28% on rent)

Coventry – average rent £637, average salary £26,410 (29% on rent)

Plymouth – average rent £637, average salary £26,410 (29% on rent)

The least affordable places to rent in England: 

Brighton and Hove – average rent £1,302, average salary £29,938 (52% on rent)

Bath – average rent £1,288, average salary £29,900 (52% on rent)

Oxford – average rent £1,366, average salary £31,838 (51% on rent) 

Exeter – average rent £976, average salary £23,650 (50% on rent)

Bristol – average rent £1,070, average salary £27,082 (47% on rent)

York – average rent £1,034, average salary £26,442 (47% on rent)

Cambridge – average rent £1,225, average salary £31,941 (46% on rent)

City of Westminster – average rent £2,832, average salary £78,391 (43% on rent)

Manchester – average rent £839, average salary £23,750 (42% on rent)

Chichester – average rent £966, average salary £27,926 (42% on rent)

City of London – average rent £2,377, average salary £70,171 (41% on rent)

Portsmouth – average rent £812, average salary £24,473 (40% on rent)

Southampton – average rent £793, average salary £24,367 (39% on rent)

Norwich – average rent £787, average salary £24,434 (39% on rent)

Leicester – average rent £647, average salary £21,353 (36% on rent). 

Jason Harris-Cohen, managing director of Open Property Group, said: “It is noteworthy that the North/South divide is highly evident, demonstrating the low rental values in all cities north of Warwick. I am quite surprised with the least affordable and I wouldn’t have expected Portsmouth to appear in it.”