Honolulu has landed near the very bottom of a new national ranking of the best places to retire, with financial analysts pointing to sky-high rent and grocery bills that dwarf costs in cities like Brownsville, Texas. A one-bedroom apartment in downtown Honolulu rents for an average of $2,913 a month, compared to just $947 in central Brownsville, and a simple liter of milk costs $2.30 in Honolulu versus 87 cents in the Texas border city.
The gap comes from WalletHub’s 2026 study comparing 182 U.S. cities on their fitness for retirement, as detailed by Islands.com. Honolulu ranked 179th out of 182 cities for affordability, according to WalletHub, and Brownsville had the lowest adjusted cost of living among all the cities compared. An inexpensive restaurant meal in Honolulu runs about $28 on average, nearly triple the roughly $10 an equivalent meal costs in Brownsville. Overall, WalletHub found Honolulu’s adjusted cost of living to be twice as high as Brownsville’s.
Yet the same study didn’t leave Honolulu in last place across the board. The city placed third nationwide for quality of life and ninth for activities available to retirees, pulling its overall retirement score up to 61st out of the 182 cities ranked. Florida cities, meanwhile, occupied three of WalletHub’s top five retirement locales overall.
A Separate Study Ranked Hawaii Dead Last Among States
WalletHub isn’t the only outfit sounding the alarm on Hawaii’s cost burden for retirees. A 2025 study by Retirement Living ranked Hawaii 50th, dead last, among all 50 states for retirees, giving the state an affordability score of just 5.6 out of 30, even as it ranked the state third highest for quality of life, according to Hawaii Public Radio. The dual findings underscore a recurring pattern in how outside researchers view the islands: gorgeous surroundings, brutal price tags…