In short
Hamburg is a port before it is a city: the docks, the canals and the Elbe organise everything, and the Speicherstadt, a district of brick warehouses on piles, is a World Heritage site.
It is a city of daily life more than of monuments. People come to live here, rarely for three days.
What it really costs
Rents are high but stay below Munich for a bigger city. The gap widens as soon as you move away from the Alster districts.
The Elbphilharmonie plaza, thirty-seven metres above the harbour, is reached free of charge: you just need a timed ticket, collected on site. The concert hall itself is paid.
What nobody tells you
The weather is the real subject. Wind, fine rain and low cloud dominate much of the year, and Hamburgers have a word for it. A waterproof layer serves better than an umbrella.
The Sunday fish market opens at five in the morning and closes at half past nine. You do not catch it by getting up late: it is the end of Saturday night that leads there.
The Reeperbahn districts change character completely with the hour. An ordinary street by day is not the same street at two in the morning.