Toronto, Vancouver tied as most expensive Canadian cities: survey

Vancouver's downtown core is seen in an image taken from Chopper 9 by CTV Vancouver's Pete Cline in April 2018.

An annual cost of living survey shows Toronto and Vancouver are Canada's most expensive cities.

Mercer's survey ranks more than 375 cities around the world and considers factors like the cost of housing, transportation, food, clothing and other expenses compared to New York City as the base.

In this year's ranking Toronto advanced 10 spots to the 109th spot and Vancouver fell two spots to tie with Toronto.

Mercer says most Canadian cities fell in this year's ranking, including Montreal – down 18 spots to 147 – and Calgary – down 11 spots to 154.

Mercer says the drop comes due to relatively stable market conditions.

The survey says Hong Kong, Tokyo, Zurich, Singapore and Seoul are the top five most expensive cities in the world.