Are you single? Are you looking for love? If you answered yes to both of these questions then the chances are you live in Kent's most hopeless town for finding a soulmate.

Dating gurus and number-crunchers studied the amount it costs to live in towns and cities across the UK along with the average cost of a typical dates and the results may come as a surprise.

While Oxford, the city of dreaming spires, tops the list of the best places to live if you want to find a long-term lover, our Northern Irish friends in Belfast will have the most trouble in their quest for romance.

Research from I Saw It First found Maidstone to be the second worst town for people to live if they want to end their barren spell ahead of Crawley, Woking and Chelmsford.

The ranking factors in their findings included the percentage of single people living in the city or town, the cost of two cinema tickets, the cost of a three-course meal, the cost of a pint of beer, median salary and rent as a percentage of earnings.

Around 49% of Maidstone's population is said to be single.

This hardly comes as a shock when based on calculations of £23 for two cinema tickets and £50 for a two-person meal.

These eye-watering prices would suggest singledom is the best way to save a few pennies.

Money, though, is not the key to happiness for some. An average price of £4 a pint could be considered sobering in itself.

The rest makes for grim reading as Maidstone scores a paltry 44% once the data has been analysed.

Top 10 cities overall

1. Oxford
2. Liverpool
3. Manchester
4. Cardiff
5. Norwich
6. Nottingham
7. Glasgow
8. Reading
9. Dundee
10. Kingston upon Hull

Worst 10 cities and towns for singletons

1. Belfast
2. Maidstone
3. Crawley
4. Woking
5. Chelmsford
6. Swindon
7. London
8. Luton
9. High Wycombe
10. Slough

Top five cities with the highest % of single people

When out and about it can sometimes feel like everyone is in a relationship, however, these cities are the ones with the most single people, which gives you a better chance of finding someone.

1. Manchester - 70.6%
2. Glasgow - 69%
3. Nottingham - 68.4%
4. Brighton - 68.2%
5. Liverpool - 67.7%

The five cities and towns with the lowest % of single people

However, in some places, even if everything else is in your favour, you just can't escape the fact that there just aren't that many fellow singles! Here are the five places that the study found to have the lowest % of singles.

1. Belfast - 34.2%
2. Woking - 46.4%
3. Basingstoke - 47.5%
4. High Wycombe - 47.6%
5. Solihull - 48.4%

For the full data visit www.isawitfirst.com/pages/best-cities-in-uk-to-be-single