Athens is quite cheap, and doesn't get too cold in the winter. For the cheapest Mediterranean beach cities, there's Antalya and Izmir in Turkey. It's easy to l

Athens is quite cheap, and doesn't get too cold in the winter. For the cheapest Mediterranean beach cities, there's Antalya and Izmir in Turkey. It's easy to live under $2k a month in many of the places you mentioned. I lived for under $800 a month easy. It dropped even lower after I moved in with my current partner. What matters to you? Air quality is not great in parts of Turkey or Serbia. I hate seeing cars so I may move out of Cluj soon. If you're gay, some regions will be too, uh, conservative. Weather... anything far from the coast will have all four seasons. I highly recommend cities with a large university presence - if you're young you don't really want to live in a retirement destination.