Situation in the real estate market... madness

Snore, can't get more cliché than that? Noble Schröder from Düsseldorf with his office job against the honest steelworker? That was already exaggerated back in the days of the Schimanski Tatort.

That was also meant as a clichéd Duisburg bashing from Scout as a response... Are you from the Palatinate? You have to explain a lot to them. *clichésoff*
(I studied in Düsseldorf. A professor said, "You are no longer at home. Speak proper German!" I stood next to girls in the lab who handled sulfuric acid wearing D&G jeans. With a few guys from there in the old town. They could also quite well confirm the common clichés, then I stopped.)

That means: exaggerated, but not untrue at its core. You don't have to be a steelworker to basically see it differently.

The Duisburg area and surroundings within 100km are so ugly that no one would voluntarily live there. Bavaria is simply the more attractive location, does it have to be Munich? I don't think so

The Duisburg area and the 100km surroundings are so ugly that no one would voluntarily want to live there. Bavaria is simply the more attractive location, but does it have to be Munich? I don't think so

... says someone who has no clue.

Sorry. By the way, within the area there are some of the most livable cities in Germany, as well as the Lower Rhine, the Rhineland (where leather trouser wearers cannot keep up with the Rhineland merrymakers), and with a 100km radius we are almost at the beach in Holland.
There are also around 40-50 colleges/universities in the area you mentioned (the Ruhr area, for example, has the highest density of universities in Europe) and many other treats.

I have no desire to move to Bavaria, where the annual cattle drive is the biggest highlight, everyone walks around in costumes (it’s called Dirndl and Lederhosen, I suppose) and people speak even worse German than our foreigners in the Ruhr area
Enough mocking. That doesn’t help the original poster.

Have a look around the north of Rheinhausen (Oestrum/Bergheim). Moers Schwafheim, Moers Kapellen (possibly also Neukirchen-Vluyn/Kamp-Lintfort nearby). Niep/Traar/Elfrath. There are so many beautiful spots (green and with suitable infrastructure), you just have to look around and drive around.

Then comes Franconia. It is the better Bavaria, without lederhosen, without alpine pastures. Uh no, we are not Bavarians or now with a Franconian as prime minister?

I do find it annoying when the Americans see us all wearing lederhosen, but I have gotten used to it and come to terms with it. But that now here, where you almost "know" each other, things are spoken about in such an undifferentiated way surprises me. Some seem to have neatly organized drawers in their heads. Try leaving out the words "all," "always," or "never," then you won't be unfair to some. Life has taught me that, despite some truth in the core of stereotypes, there are almost more exceptions than rules... in this sense, greetings from a Swabian who is anything but frugal.