The 5 Best Gay Cities to Retire in Spain | Queer Money Ep. 592

Where are the Best Gay Retirement Cities in Spain?

Hola, Spain! You voted, we listened—and this week, we’re heading to the land of tapas, Gaudí, and gay beaches to reveal the Top 5 Cities in Spain for Gay Retirees!

From Malaga's chill beach vibes to Barcelona’s big gay energy, we’re breaking down:

• 🌈 The LGBTQ+ scene in each city
• 💸 Rent and cost of living
• 🏳️‍🌈 Our Queer Money® Retirement Rating
• And, of course, our favorite perks (hi, Bear Week in Sitges 🐻💦)

Spoiler alert: You can see Africa from your house, and yes, the best paella is in Valencia.

Whether you're dreaming of mañana mornings or plotting your fabulous early retirement, this is your Spanish gaycation starter pack. 🌴💃

🎧 Episode 592 is brought to you by PensionBee—helping you consolidate those old 401(k)s so you can plan your Happy Gay Retirement with ease. 🐝

📲 Tap that subscribe button, share with your wanderlust-y queer friends, and grab your Happy Gay Retirement Calculator in the episode description.

Next up: Mexico! But for now… stay fabulous. ✨

Takeaways:

• 🗣️ Pro tip: Don’t be that American - Want the full Spanish fantasy? Learn the language. It’s sexy and respectful.
• 🏖️ Malaga = sun, culture, and cheap rent—but bring your Spanish dictionary - This coastal cutie is wallet-friendly, but English isn’t widely spoken. Time to practice those rolling R’s!
• 🍊 Valencia is laid-back luxe - It’s giving: beachy, artsy, and unapologetically queer—with fewer crowds and more charm than the big cities.
• 🎨 Madrid has it all—museums, parks, nightlife, and Pride with a capital P - Just watch for some recent political shade trying to dim its sparkle.
• Sitges is cute and uber gay - the small beachside town south of Barcelona where we gayed it up for three months in 2019
• 🏙️ Barcelona is big, bold, and fabulously gay - You’ll pay more for the privilege, but the culture, community, and queer life? Chef’s kiss.

Chapters:

• 0:00 - Intro - Don't be that American
• 0:25 - Malaga - Affordable and expat-friendly
• 2:13 - Valencia - Gorgeous and big
• 4:30 - Madrid - Packed with gays, the capital in the center of the country and hot, hot hot
• 6:52 - Sitges - The gay mecca of Europe and host of International Bear Week every September
• 9:37 - Barcelona - Arts, culture, beaches and a gay nightlife to please just about any gay

Episode Transcript

(00:10):
Hola, Spain.
Yes, Spain is one of ourfavorite countries.
And according to recent QueerMoney polls, across multiple platforms,
most of you have told usthat's the country you would want
to retire in.
So what are the best cities inSpain for gay retirees?
This is Queer Money episodenumber 592, brought to you today
by Pensionbee.

(00:30):
And today we're sharing withyou the top five cities in Spain
for gay retirees.
Coming in at number five,going from five to one, we have Malaga,
which is one of our favoritecities in Spain.
Had a great time there ourselves.
So why is Malaga great?
It's got a warm.
It has warm weather, has greatculture, Tons and tons of culture.
But, I mean, arguably most ofSpain has great culture, has a thriving

(00:54):
expat scene, and it's one ofthe more affordable cities on this
particular list, especiallyrelative to Madrid and Barcelona.
And one of the great featuresabout Malaga is that you can see
Africa from your house.
One of the downsides, however,is that there's not a lot of English
speaking there.
You definitely have to learnyour language.
And let's just say that acrossthe board, with all the countries
we are talking about in thisseries, don't be that American.

(01:16):
Learn the language as best youcan to at least get a conversation
started.
There's some respect.
Also, it's not really agigantic city.
You're not going to have a lotof the gigantic city amenities.
It's a little bit more toned down.
It's got a sort of a beachlife going on.
That reminds me a little bitof Santa Barbara, California.
Yeah.
Yeah, I could see that.
Absolutely.
So what's the LGBTQ vibe?
It's definitely more on thechill side, but it's also very welcoming.

(01:39):
Some career perks include thatthey have several LGBTQ plus bars.
They do have Pride eventsevery year, and about half.
It's about a half an hourdrive away from Termalinos.
Did I say that right?
Yeah.
Terminos, which is a gay hotspot.
Yeah, a very gay hot spot.
So this might be like thesuburb of Terminus.
Right.
Is Malaga.
Two bedroom apartment theregoes for about 1400 US dollars a

(02:00):
month.
So definitely more affordablethan the US and Canada, which was
the last city that we or thelast country we discussed.
The overall cost of living isabout 35% below the US national average.
So Malika gets the Queer Moneyretirement rating of eight and a
half out of ten.
Nice.
Coming in at number four is Valencia.
Valencia is a gorgeous city.

(02:21):
It's beautiful.
The best paella that we'veever Had.
Absolutely.
It's a very colonial looking city.
So the architecture is reallya big part of this city.
It is a coastal city withMediterranean charm.
It's very walkable and it hasexcellent healthcare.
It does have a slightly slowerpaced life than say, for example,
Barcelona, but it is still vibrant.

(02:43):
Lots of oranges.
Yes, that's where they come from.
Valencia, oranges.
One of the things to rememberabout Valencia is it is one of the
largest cities in Spain andfor that reason it's a much more
industrial city, especially onthe outskirts.
Some of the downsides are thatit can get very hot there in the
summer.
Again, it's a Spanish city.

(03:05):
It's important that you learnSpanish before you go there.
The LGBTQ vibe is a very openminded, artistic and inclusive city.
It is.
Has a very active pride scene,lots of LGBTQ bars and it has a great
beach vibe.
Very a great beach scene going on.
As far as cost of living, it'sa little bit more expensive here.

(03:26):
Average two bedroom, twobathroom is going to cost you about
1600-1650amonth US dollars.
Overall cost of living isabout 35% lower than the US average,
which is significant discount.
So for that reason we aregiving it a Queer Money retirement
rating of 9 out of 10.
Yes.

(03:46):
You might notice that Davidand I are wearing these hats.
Both say Es on it.
If you're not familiar withthe Spanish clothing line es, definitely
check out their website.
You'll find if you know, youknow you're going to like what you
see.
And suddenly your Facebook adswill become all about Spanish clothing
lines.
Right?
You might notice that thisanalysis, you're recognizing more

(04:08):
of the city names relative tothe analysis we did for Canada.
But that's simply becauseSpain as a whole is simply more affordable
than the United States and Canada.
Canada might as well just bethe 51st state, right?
No.
If you like this series, ifyou like this particular episode,
please remember to share it inthe comments.
What you're liking and notliking about it, what we got right
and what we you didn't thinkwe got right.

(04:29):
And of course, please sharethis with other people and then let
us know what countries youwant us to visit in the future and
why.
And in two weeks we're goingto be doing Mexico.
Right, so stay tuned for that.
Coming in at number three isthe capital of Spain.
That is Madrid.
Madrid, again is anothercolonial looking city.
Again, gorgeous architecture.
It has excellent publictransportation, healthcare, beautiful

(04:53):
museums and great cuisine.
Amazing parks.
Yes, exactly.
We ran through the parks there.
Very, very hot days.
Yeah, Exactly.
That's one of the downsides,is that it's not on the coast and
it can get very hot in thesummertime there.
It has a great LGBTQ vibe.
It is politically and sociallyprogressive for the most part.

(05:14):
I will say there's a caveat there.
There has been a recent pushto the right.
There have been some attacksagainst the trans community there
legislatively, so be carefulabout that.
Although there is a massiveLGBTQ population there, and one of
the queer perks are the queer neighborhoods.
There are so many of them andthey're super cute and they're full

(05:37):
of queer cafes.
Inclusive areas that it doeshave an international pride festival.
One of the neighborhoods, Ithink is pronounced Chueca.
So it's a beautiful place thatwe stayed in for a couple of days.
I would definitely recommendchecking that.
We pretty much slept in a closet.
David had to sleep on a cotand I had to sleep on the floor.

(05:59):
And typically by morning Davidwas on the floor with me.
We were actually staying witha friend who had gotten an Airbnb
for a couple of weeks.
And I think the bathroomshower wasn't much bigger than my
Apple laptop.
Yeah, I think it was two feet by.
By two feet.
It was tiny.
Anyway, some of the benefitshere are the cost of living.
A two bedroom, two bathroomruns around fifteen hundred dollars
a month.

(06:20):
The overall cost of living isabout 30% lower than the U.S.
average.
And because it is such a bigmetropolitan city, there's a lot
of things going on there forqueer people, for both in the queer
community and outside.
So for that reason, we give ita queer money retirement rating of
nine and a half out of ten.
We will say had it not beenfor the anti trans attacks from the

(06:41):
far right in Madrid, we wouldhave got given it a 10 out of 10.
Correct.
So maybe work on that.
Spain coming in at number twois one of our most favorite places
in the entire world, and thatis Sicha Spain.
Why is it great?
Why isn't it great?
There's just nothing that'snot great about Sica Spain.
It's a coastal town just southof Barcelona, about 30 minutes.
It's super simple.

(07:02):
Train ride from both thedowntown Barcelona as well as from
the airport.
It's just world famous, worldfamous gay tourism everywhere because
of that.
Unfortunately though, the oneof the downsides is that the cost
of living is relatively high.
It's increasing in demand.
More and more LGBTQ pluspeople, gay men particularly, are
looking to move there.
It was recently listed one ofthe beaches there in Siches was Recently

(07:24):
listed in the Wall StreetJournal as the best beach in the
world.
So the word's getting out.
Therefore, unfortunately, thecost is going up.
The gay vibe there is just.
It's just everywhere.
You just see LGBTQ + people everywhere.
It's very opening and veryopen and accepting, even though it
does have a religious influence.
I mean, you can see thechurch, the Peninsula Church, from
pretty much any vantage point there.

(07:45):
And the people, the Spanishpeople who live there are can be
somewhat conservative, butthey're very open and accepting of
LGBTQ plus people.
So definitely a place to check.
Walk around holding hands as asame sex couple all throughout town.
They don't care.
So it's got a gay.
It's got an amazing gay beachthat is just great for sightseeing.
Lots and lots of sightseeingon that beach.
Has a queer film festivalevery year.
It has a pride scene.

(08:05):
There are LGBTQ plus bars,nightclubs, restaurants, you name
it.
Cafes.
I think it's.
The population of siches isaround 26,000.
And when we were there, therewere 14 gay bars or queer bars right
before the pandemic.
Crazy as to how many of themwere there.
Yeah.
And it has a gigantic bearfestival every year.

(08:26):
Yes, International Bear Week is.
And it's not a week.
I think it's 10 or 11 days isusually the first week in September.
And I forget somebody told ushow much money generates for them
every year.
It's like a ridiculous amountof money.
Yeah.
Anyway, a two bedroomapartment goes for about $1,800 US
a month.
We stayed there for three months.
Do you remember how much wespent each month?
Yeah, we stayed in a placethat was two bedroom with a loft

(08:50):
area, three bathrooms, akitchen, a full living room, and
we paid $1,100 a month.
But that was in 2019.
And then when we were backduring the low season.
Yeah.
And then we were back in 2022.
2, 23.
23.
How much did we spend?
Remember that was a little bitmore expensive because we didn't
extend over a month.

(09:11):
Two weeks, I think.
Yeah.
Anyway, all right.
Overall cost of living isabout 20% lower than the average
cost in the United States.
I mean, we couldn't give thisanything but a 10 out of 10 for our
pre money retirement.
There's a possibility we'vegiven it 11.
That's what you're getting.
So if you want to increaseyour chances of retiring in Spain,
consolidate all yourretirement accounts, get control
over that all in one place soyou can manage your financial future.

(09:34):
Pension B can help you do thatand make it easy.
Click the Pension B link inyour podcast player if you're listening
the description of thisYouTube video if you're watching
or scan the QR code on yourscreen today.
All right, so our winner,which probably no surprise to anybody,
is Barcelona.
So why did Barcelona get thetop spot?
Well, it's a world class city.
There's just culture everywhere.

(09:54):
Architecture is meaning is amazing.
Grotto, familia, if youhaven't checked that out, it's a
must see for sure.
Healthcare there is great.
It has a huge internationaland expat community.
In fact, we just had a friendmove back home to Denver from Barcelona
recently.
One of the downsides though isthat it is a big city.
So it has all the big city challenges.
It has expensive housing, busytourists, tourist season pretty much

(10:17):
all year round.
It's just like a year roundtourist season.
Yeah, the LGBTQ plus vibe ispretty amazing though.
It's a it's known as gay Meccain Europe.
Queer parks include GayZambla, which is a gay district in
Barcelona, has strong prideevents every year, has a gay beach,
queer nightlife, queer bars,restaurants, shops, es shops are

(10:37):
there.
Super fun.
I spend more money there thanI should every time that we go.
Average two bedroom, twobathroom apartment goes for about
1700 US dollars a month.
The overall cost of living isabout 25% that of the United States
and.
For this reason it's 25%lower, not 20%, 25% of, but it translates

(10:57):
about 25% low lower.
And then the queer moneyretirement rating is a 10 out of
10.
So let us know what cities youthink we missed in Spain and why.
I can think of a couple.
They're usually they're in thenorth but they didn't make the list.
And tell us what othercountries you want us to visit.
Grab the links to the GrowingQueer Money Retirement rating card
and your happy Gay Retirementcalculator in the description below

(11:20):
or your podcast player.
And finally, if you love thisepisode and you like the series,
please give us a subscribe andshare this with other friends of
yours who want to retireabroad fabulously.
And until next time, stay fabulous.