I study in a tiny (280k) people city in northern Germany. and rent for a tiny one-room apartment without window is — if you want to get an apartment without waiting for years – also around 350€. Not cheap.

All rents anywhere in Europe worth living in 2015 are expensive - but London really is one of those cities in its own league.

Just to clarify a couple of things:

350€ is about £250

£400 won't get you a tiny one-room apartment without windows, that would be amazing! It'll get you a tiny windowless room, in a pretty grim house shared with 3 or 4 (or 5, or 6) other people, in an awful or really out-in-the-sticks location. (You can optimise by substituting some of the factors, but any way you slice it, a £400 room anywhere in Greater London is not going to be good).

Probably the baseline for a studio apartment (I've never seriously looked so could be a bit off) is £800-£900 per month for anywhere resembling a decent location.

"£400 won't get you a tiny one-room apartment without windows, that would be amazing! It'll get you a tiny windowless room,"

yes, they lived in rooms, not appartements indeed.

350 euro is £250.

£400 is 560 euro.

A London resident will need to pay council tax (about £900 per year for the property) and transport (who knows; about £200 per month for zones 1-5).

That's nothing. I have 5 windows and 2 actual bedrooms although one is debatable and that commands an extra £1100 a month on top of that.

Going back to 2002 my first flat was a place under a betting shop in Islington and had a door that we couldn't open and had no idea where it went to and that was £600/month. Oh and it smelled of piss and shit.

Fairly standard for such a low rent, she's lucky she didn't have mice skittering over her feet in her kitchen...

I think the live ones cost more.

400 pounds a month in london, that is bloody cheap !

Though not having a window is illegal