8 ms·

In Switzerland, most people rent for life

46 points by jbredeche 3y ago

drupe 3y ago
https://archive.ph/TnhIk https://archive.ph/TnhIk
Ericson2314 3y ago
> But any preference for renting here collides with a stark financial reality: National surveys show that in recent decades, Swiss homeowners have been better off, at least in terms of wealth. This is poor reasoning. Land ownership wealth is ill-gotten zero-sum. More homeownership won't build more wealth, it will just distribute the land rents differently. Taxation can also redistribute land rent, and far more fairly than "mass homeownership" which isn't really a sustainable system anywhere. > which is advantageous from a tax perspective because mortgage interest is tax deductible. Not good! Especially given the high VAT.
- gottorf 3y ago
  > Taxation can also redistribute land rent, and far more fairly than "mass homeownership" which isn't really a sustainable system anywhere. A Georgist land value tax would do that job admirably, though it will probably never happen in any jurisdiction, since it would hurt wealthy landowners the most. That could be why "mass home ownership" is a more politically palatable flavor of the same base concept; both will spread land rents among more people.
  - Ericson2314 3y ago
    Mass homeownership works for like 2 generations, maybe more with 0 immigration and no population growth. That's a bad bet.
- coldtea 3y ago
  >More homeownership won't build more wealth, it will just distribute the land rents differently. That's fine. We'd rather have better distribution of the land and social wealth in general, than "building more wealth".
  - Ericson2314 3y ago
    I agree that is a good goal. But the most robust realization of goal is less homeownership, and boxing in landowners. Looks like Switzerland is doing a good job of the former. The rent control is more important to make renting lower risk (avoiding rent increase risk and building land wealth are two different goals of homeownership, the first is much more laudable). Curtailing rental incoming is similar to an LVT, except it doesn't have the incentives for densification. Europe could probably use a bit more of the latter so there is less immigration vs cheap housing going on.
misja111 3y ago
The article could have mentioned the main cause for the recent crazy rise of house prices in Switzerland; the negative interest rate. Lately the Swiss interest rate has gone up, although not as much as elsewhere, and the effect can already been seen, house prices are dropping.
- Ericson2314 3y ago
  We should probably track mortgage payments not valuations over time.
  - bobthepanda 3y ago
    It is still important, since a higher price means a higher down payment.
- dbrgn 3y ago
  One effect of this was that big companies and pension funds were desperate for some way to park their money. This lead to the situation that they would build lots of new appartment buildings in metropolitan areas that would remain empty for years, not returning any income, they were just a vehicle to park the money. At the same time, this development was detrimental for the towns, but the towns couldn't do much against it. In the towns, people would move from the old appartments in the center to the cheap new appartments in the outskirts, leaving behind a dead center. (There was an article about this effect in the "Tagesanzeiger" called "Die Huttwilisierung der Schweiz", worth reading.)
add-sub-mul-div 3y ago
Shortly after I bought a house I started dating someone younger, about 32, and despite my older age she couldn't believe I'd done it. She said she called me "*** The Homeowner" to her friends. It really brought it home (no pun) to me how far the expectations of younger generations have fallen. Frankly though, I rented for a long time and if the economics of it would have continued to work out for me, I could have done it for life, in principle. That's if I thought I could afford to keep doing it rather than get squeezed with accelerating rent increases and decreases in service that have come to define every aspect of our economy over the last 4 years. But things are in a bad spiral.
- ghaff 3y ago
  Not that a mortgage paid-off home is free (especially a house--especially older, with land, etc.), but there does come a point for most people when the income coming in goes down, they still need to live someplace, and you have at least some control if you own a place. You still owe taxes and have some maintenance to coder but it's not quite like having a monthly bill that has to be paid no matter what and you're always exposed to a landlord just deciding to sell. There are also non-financial tradeoffs but some degree of stability is probably desirable if there is no reason to think you'll want to pickup and move across the country.
  - swatcoder 3y ago
    Now look at real-world data for how many (few) residences are actually owned free and clear. I'm with you that there's a personal strategy of having a paid off house and the sense of security it provides, but people-in-aggregate don't seem to be pursuing that strategy. It seems that what almost all homeowners actually do is take out long mortgages, reset their paydown clocks by refinancing, finance equity back out in second mortgages and liens, etc, never actually reaching the "no monthly bill" stage. So if people are honest about probably being in the same cohort when the time comes for themselves, then there's not so much distinction between paying a landlord forever and paying a bank forever. You may know better about yourself, and people may have other reasons to prefer homeownership, but it doesn't seem to be about security in retirement. At least not in practice.
Tiktaalik 3y ago
> In their 70s, Swiss homeowners are 11 times wealthier than renters their age, according to a study by Ursina Kuhn at the Swiss Foundation for Research in Social Sciences in Lausanne. > The catch is that in order to become a homeowner, “you need wealth to get more wealth,” as Ms. Kuhn put it. We're approaching a Neo-Feudalism society where the only people who will be able to afford to buy homes are those whose parents and grandparents were able to buy homes. Tbh if you replaced "Switzerland" here with "Canada" this article reads the same as many other articles I've read recently. This is becoming a very common problem in many jurisdictions. I think the spiking costs of housing and incredible rent seeking is/will have really bad impacts on the economy as more and more wealth is devoted purely to housing and unavailable for anything else. I'm lucky enough to have been able to buy property and to have stability of housing tenure, but as a result, despite posting this comment on an entrepreneurial tech forum, I couldn't imagine being able to create a startup right now or ever. Where would the money come from? All my money is going toward housing costs. This is the big problem as rents (both from landlords and other oligopolies) take up a bigger and bigger share of people's income. No money for creating a new business, and no money for customers to spend at a new business. Everyone suffers.
- gonzo41 3y ago
  The problem is also compounded by the fact that "Bricks and Mortar" are considered a middle class investment. And most of that investing class aren't really ok with accepting that a loss of money can also be part of having an investment. So consequently they create pressure with their political mass to stall all changes in policy that may be for the better. I don't see a crash coming, I see stalling economies as all the well just locks itself up in housing for a generation.
- purplerabbit 3y ago
  I think the solution to this is an incremental shift towards property taxes + away from income taxes. Doing so would nullify the investment arms race that’s turning home ownership into a sick financial game. If you’re paying 6%/year in property taxes, a home is no longer an “investment”, and the house hoarding (especially by the likes of investors buying single-family housing) will cease. People will buy homes to have a place to live, and the market will cool off. This comes with the additional benefit of progressively taxing wealth instead of solely income. Wealth discrepancy is orders of magnitude worse than income discrepancy, and currently we’re doing almost nothing about that.
starttoaster 3y ago
[flagged]
kleiba 3y ago
Then who owns all the houses in Switzerland? Is it banks? Corporations? Or many individuals who inherited their ancestor's properties?
- jareklupinski 3y ago
  > who owns all the houses in Switzerland? No one, apparently > Many Swiss rely on perpetual refinancing to afford their homes. Switzerland is the land of luxury watches, fine chocolates — and lifelong mortgages. It’s not uncommon for borrowers to extend their loans until their deaths, which is advantageous from a tax perspective because mortgage interest is tax deductible. It also gives a lot of business to Switzerland’s vaunted banking industry.
  - xormapmap 3y ago
    > It’s not uncommon for borrowers to extend their loans until their deaths How is this possible? I can't imagine any bank giving me a loan knowing there's a good chance I won't be alive to pay it back.
    - theandrewbailey 3y ago
      Property doesn't stop existing when the owner dies. When the owner dies, the property is probably sold soon after, then loan is paid.
    - bafe 3y ago
      The heirs will inherit the loan. If they refuse it,the house would be sold and the profit will be used to repay the loan
- expertentipp 3y ago
  Domestic aristocratic and industrialist families, Slavic oligarchs, Arabic sheikhs, Chinese dignitaries, foreign dictators and kings, organized crime, Tina Turner. The same in all DACH countries.
- rspoerri 3y ago
lukasfischer 3y ago
I’m from Switzerland and the article tells the truth. Buying is crazy expensive! And there is one thing the article is not mentioning: if you own a house, there is a fictional “rent” income on your own property, which is “income” on to of your real salary income and gets taxed… there were many approaches to get rid of the law, but it never went through. Also, in the last years the interest rates were crazy low for loans in Switzerland. 0.6% (!!) you read right was normal. It changed recently as the Swiss national bank increased its the reference interest rate to about 2.5% - still low compared to other countries. Which means, if you have 1m in load it meant 1m0.006 =6000/year of interest rate! Today 1m0.025=25000/year
- petercooper 3y ago
  if you own a house, there is a fictional “rent” income on your own property, which is “income” on to of your real salary income and gets taxed… Is this essentially a Swiss equivalent of property taxes/council taxes?
- secretsatan 3y ago
  I think it’s a bit messed up and could probably be done better, but doesn’t that tax exist to even things out between renters and homeowners?
- mamonster 3y ago
  Most banks have had advertisements bordering on scam and malpractice to explain why the SARON adjustable rate is better than locking in a fix rate. I've literally had to explain to like 5 people the amount of risk they were taking on by holding on to a 0.8% Saron adjustable instead of getting something like 0.9-0.95% fixed rate for 15! years. It's unfortunate that most people simply don't intuitively understand that when interest rates go from 1% to 2% your payments double.
  - dbrgn 3y ago
    If you can manage the risk of rising interest rate, then SARON isn't a bad choice. At least in the past, sticking to LIBOR/SARON was the cheapest option on average. But of course, if you can't handle the risk of rate increases, you shouldn't do it. (One option to reduce the risk is to pay the difference between SARON and the current fixed rates onto a dedicated savings account.) But of course, if had gotten the chance to get a <1% 15-year deal, I'd have done it :) I'm slightly late to the party.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
paulcole 3y ago
I'm American and I've never felt the appeal of homeownership. In fact for me the opposite has been true. I see it as something I want to avoid. I just don't see any of the upsides that so many people seem to. It's unfortunate (for me) that owning a home is some key component of the American Dream. I see so many people who prioritize owning a home over everything else and it just doesn't make a ton of sense to me. The more people who see renting for life as a great option, the better our society would be, IMO. Renting currently has disadvantages too (nothing's perfect), but I think a lot of people would have higher quality of life if they looked beyond home ownership. Think about all the people who claim they wish they didn't have to drive so much and how they wish they could walk more. They could easily do this if they hadn't bought a house in the suburbs! Rent a small apartment and walk wherever you want. It's great! Another interesting article from the NYT on the topic of renting for life: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/23/magazine/vienna-social-housing.html https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/23/magazine/vienna-social-ho...
- xormapmap 3y ago
  > I just don't see any of the upsides that so many people seem to. The way I see it I'm going to be paying a mortgage either way. I'd rather it be my own than my landlord's.
  - paulcole 3y ago
    Why exactly? I'm fine with paying for someone else to own the roof over my head. I've just prioritized keeping that cost as low as possible so I can do other things with my money.
    - MattPalmer1086 3y ago
      I can see two main reasons. When the mortgage is paid off: 1) you own a valuable asset. 2) your cost of living falls dramatically.
      - paulcole 3y ago
mrazomor 3y ago
I lived in places where renting is unregulated/not protected, and in the places where it's well regulated. IMO, being able to do a long term and safe rent is the biggest win for the financial planning and personal finance you can get: - people can become independent as soon as they find their first job (living with a roommate is an option to get a bigger place -- valid even for decades if that fits ones lifestyle) - high personal wealth liquidity (invest in financial markets, move to a cheaper place if the situation asks for it, move to a bigger place if the family grows) - if the place that costs 2M to buy, an be rented for 3k, that's 50y of rent! (or even more, as the maintenance, tax & mortgage cost outperform the rent increase, not to mention a loss from not investing that money) and, think how the place will look after 50y... But the renting must be very well regulated -- to make it a comfortable living. That's something worth (politically) fighting for. (a happy renter)
- Pet_Ant 3y ago
  I mean if you have regular safe long-term rental, then it shifts the burden onto the landowner. It means the don't make much in good times, and if there is a drought in terms of demand (plant closures, surplus building) they are left holding the bag. Really, the answer is for things that need a delicate balance to be handled by an arms-length public corporation.
anotherhue 3y ago
Now price in the negative non-financial aspects of renting: * Inability to make changes to the building * Constant fear of eviction for the flimsiest of reasons * No tax reduction on rent payments (but often on mortgage interest - a gobsmacking reality) * Arbitrary rules imposed on you long beyond your childhood years: Pets/no pets, smoking/no smoking, rug surface area requirements etc.
- paulcole 3y ago
  As a lifelong renter: > Inability to make changes to the building Who cares? What are you people dreaming of doing to buildings? I sleep, watch TV, shower, and cook dinner in my apartment. Doesn't take a lot to satisfy me, I guess. > Constant fear of eviction for the flimsiest of reasons A good argument for governmental protection of renters. > No tax reduction on rent payments (but often on mortgage interest - a gobsmacking reality) Don't care. My rent is so much lower than a mortgage that I don't mind missing out on the tax benefits. > Arbitrary rules imposed on you long beyond your childhood years: Pets/no pets, smoking/no smoking, rug surface area requirements etc. There's arbitrary rules imposed on nearly every aspect of modern life. I'm not particularly bothered by a few more.
  - anotherhue 3y ago
    Windows not keeping in the heat or not keeping out the noise? Too bad, can't replace them. Air conditioner lacks any airflow in leading to huge CO2 levels? Too bad, you get the same one everyone gets. Electrical outlets in insane places? Tough. Take zero baths a year but still need to stand in one? Too bad, no real shower for you.
    - dbrgn 3y ago
      Hah, previous place ticks 3 out of 4 bulletpoints :) We didn't have an air conditioner, but thanks to leaky windows, CO2 buildup was not an issue.
    - paulcole 3y ago
      Yeah I mean those are frustrations for sure. Nothing’s perfect and it’s certainly not worth spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on a house to fix to me.
frank_bb 3y ago
[dead]
expertentipp 3y ago
Just emigrate to save for buying your home like everyone does, dummy Swiss! For example to a comet and once you collect enough rhodium and iridium, you're good to go... or stay there, it is likely cheaper than in Switzerland.
swah 3y ago
Wouldn't remote work improve this somehow? I guess everyone still wants to live in the best places instead of driving 30 minutes to the good supermarket...
- saturn_vk 3y ago
  Housing prices in rural areas in Switzerland aren't much more affordable. And that's usually where people buy, because almost no one can afford prices in the big cities

46 points by jbredeche 3y ago

https://archive.ph/TnhIk https://archive.ph/TnhIk

> But any preference for renting here collides with a stark financial reality: National surveys show that in recent decades, Swiss homeowners have been better off, at least in terms of wealth. This is poor reasoning. Land ownership wealth is ill-gotten zero-sum. More homeownership won't build more wealth, it will just distribute the land rents differently. Taxation can also redistribute land rent, and far more fairly than "mass homeownership" which isn't really a sustainable system anywhere. > which is advantageous from a tax perspective because mortgage interest is tax deductible. Not good! Especially given the high VAT.

gottorf 3y ago
> Taxation can also redistribute land rent, and far more fairly than "mass homeownership" which isn't really a sustainable system anywhere. A Georgist land value tax would do that job admirably, though it will probably never happen in any jurisdiction, since it would hurt wealthy landowners the most. That could be why "mass home ownership" is a more politically palatable flavor of the same base concept; both will spread land rents among more people.
- Ericson2314 3y ago
  Mass homeownership works for like 2 generations, maybe more with 0 immigration and no population growth. That's a bad bet.
coldtea 3y ago
>More homeownership won't build more wealth, it will just distribute the land rents differently. That's fine. We'd rather have better distribution of the land and social wealth in general, than "building more wealth".
- Ericson2314 3y ago
  I agree that is a good goal. But the most robust realization of goal is less homeownership, and boxing in landowners. Looks like Switzerland is doing a good job of the former. The rent control is more important to make renting lower risk (avoiding rent increase risk and building land wealth are two different goals of homeownership, the first is much more laudable). Curtailing rental incoming is similar to an LVT, except it doesn't have the incentives for densification. Europe could probably use a bit more of the latter so there is less immigration vs cheap housing going on.

misja111 3y ago

The article could have mentioned the main cause for the recent crazy rise of house prices in Switzerland; the negative interest rate. Lately the Swiss interest rate has gone up, although not as much as elsewhere, and the effect can already been seen, house prices are dropping.

Ericson2314 3y ago
We should probably track mortgage payments not valuations over time.
- bobthepanda 3y ago
  It is still important, since a higher price means a higher down payment.
dbrgn 3y ago
One effect of this was that big companies and pension funds were desperate for some way to park their money. This lead to the situation that they would build lots of new appartment buildings in metropolitan areas that would remain empty for years, not returning any income, they were just a vehicle to park the money. At the same time, this development was detrimental for the towns, but the towns couldn't do much against it. In the towns, people would move from the old appartments in the center to the cheap new appartments in the outskirts, leaving behind a dead center. (There was an article about this effect in the "Tagesanzeiger" called "Die Huttwilisierung der Schweiz", worth reading.)

add-sub-mul-div 3y ago

Shortly after I bought a house I started dating someone younger, about 32, and despite my older age she couldn't believe I'd done it. She said she called me "*** The Homeowner" to her friends. It really brought it home (no pun) to me how far the expectations of younger generations have fallen. Frankly though, I rented for a long time and if the economics of it would have continued to work out for me, I could have done it for life, in principle. That's if I thought I could afford to keep doing it rather than get squeezed with accelerating rent increases and decreases in service that have come to define every aspect of our economy over the last 4 years. But things are in a bad spiral.

ghaff 3y ago
Not that a mortgage paid-off home is free (especially a house--especially older, with land, etc.), but there does come a point for most people when the income coming in goes down, they still need to live someplace, and you have at least some control if you own a place. You still owe taxes and have some maintenance to coder but it's not quite like having a monthly bill that has to be paid no matter what and you're always exposed to a landlord just deciding to sell. There are also non-financial tradeoffs but some degree of stability is probably desirable if there is no reason to think you'll want to pickup and move across the country.
- swatcoder 3y ago
  Now look at real-world data for how many (few) residences are actually owned free and clear. I'm with you that there's a personal strategy of having a paid off house and the sense of security it provides, but people-in-aggregate don't seem to be pursuing that strategy. It seems that what almost all homeowners actually do is take out long mortgages, reset their paydown clocks by refinancing, finance equity back out in second mortgages and liens, etc, never actually reaching the "no monthly bill" stage. So if people are honest about probably being in the same cohort when the time comes for themselves, then there's not so much distinction between paying a landlord forever and paying a bank forever. You may know better about yourself, and people may have other reasons to prefer homeownership, but it doesn't seem to be about security in retirement. At least not in practice.

Tiktaalik 3y ago

> In their 70s, Swiss homeowners are 11 times wealthier than renters their age, according to a study by Ursina Kuhn at the Swiss Foundation for Research in Social Sciences in Lausanne. > The catch is that in order to become a homeowner, “you need wealth to get more wealth,” as Ms. Kuhn put it. We're approaching a Neo-Feudalism society where the only people who will be able to afford to buy homes are those whose parents and grandparents were able to buy homes. Tbh if you replaced "Switzerland" here with "Canada" this article reads the same as many other articles I've read recently. This is becoming a very common problem in many jurisdictions. I think the spiking costs of housing and incredible rent seeking is/will have really bad impacts on the economy as more and more wealth is devoted purely to housing and unavailable for anything else. I'm lucky enough to have been able to buy property and to have stability of housing tenure, but as a result, despite posting this comment on an entrepreneurial tech forum, I couldn't imagine being able to create a startup right now or ever. Where would the money come from? All my money is going toward housing costs. This is the big problem as rents (both from landlords and other oligopolies) take up a bigger and bigger share of people's income. No money for creating a new business, and no money for customers to spend at a new business. Everyone suffers.

gonzo41 3y ago
The problem is also compounded by the fact that "Bricks and Mortar" are considered a middle class investment. And most of that investing class aren't really ok with accepting that a loss of money can also be part of having an investment. So consequently they create pressure with their political mass to stall all changes in policy that may be for the better. I don't see a crash coming, I see stalling economies as all the well just locks itself up in housing for a generation.
purplerabbit 3y ago
I think the solution to this is an incremental shift towards property taxes + away from income taxes. Doing so would nullify the investment arms race that’s turning home ownership into a sick financial game. If you’re paying 6%/year in property taxes, a home is no longer an “investment”, and the house hoarding (especially by the likes of investors buying single-family housing) will cease. People will buy homes to have a place to live, and the market will cool off. This comes with the additional benefit of progressively taxing wealth instead of solely income. Wealth discrepancy is orders of magnitude worse than income discrepancy, and currently we’re doing almost nothing about that.

starttoaster 3y ago

[flagged]

kleiba 3y ago

Then who owns all the houses in Switzerland? Is it banks? Corporations? Or many individuals who inherited their ancestor's properties?

jareklupinski 3y ago
> who owns all the houses in Switzerland? No one, apparently > Many Swiss rely on perpetual refinancing to afford their homes. Switzerland is the land of luxury watches, fine chocolates — and lifelong mortgages. It’s not uncommon for borrowers to extend their loans until their deaths, which is advantageous from a tax perspective because mortgage interest is tax deductible. It also gives a lot of business to Switzerland’s vaunted banking industry.
- xormapmap 3y ago
  > It’s not uncommon for borrowers to extend their loans until their deaths How is this possible? I can't imagine any bank giving me a loan knowing there's a good chance I won't be alive to pay it back.
  - theandrewbailey 3y ago
    Property doesn't stop existing when the owner dies. When the owner dies, the property is probably sold soon after, then loan is paid.
  - bafe 3y ago
    The heirs will inherit the loan. If they refuse it,the house would be sold and the profit will be used to repay the loan
expertentipp 3y ago
Domestic aristocratic and industrialist families, Slavic oligarchs, Arabic sheikhs, Chinese dignitaries, foreign dictators and kings, organized crime, Tina Turner. The same in all DACH countries.
rspoerri 3y ago

lukasfischer 3y ago

I’m from Switzerland and the article tells the truth. Buying is crazy expensive! And there is one thing the article is not mentioning: if you own a house, there is a fictional “rent” income on your own property, which is “income” on to of your real salary income and gets taxed… there were many approaches to get rid of the law, but it never went through. Also, in the last years the interest rates were crazy low for loans in Switzerland. 0.6% (!!) you read right was normal. It changed recently as the Swiss national bank increased its the reference interest rate to about 2.5% - still low compared to other countries. Which means, if you have 1m in load it meant 1m0.006 =6000/year of interest rate! Today 1m0.025=25000/year

petercooper 3y ago
if you own a house, there is a fictional “rent” income on your own property, which is “income” on to of your real salary income and gets taxed… Is this essentially a Swiss equivalent of property taxes/council taxes?
secretsatan 3y ago
I think it’s a bit messed up and could probably be done better, but doesn’t that tax exist to even things out between renters and homeowners?
mamonster 3y ago
Most banks have had advertisements bordering on scam and malpractice to explain why the SARON adjustable rate is better than locking in a fix rate. I've literally had to explain to like 5 people the amount of risk they were taking on by holding on to a 0.8% Saron adjustable instead of getting something like 0.9-0.95% fixed rate for 15! years. It's unfortunate that most people simply don't intuitively understand that when interest rates go from 1% to 2% your payments double.
- dbrgn 3y ago
  If you can manage the risk of rising interest rate, then SARON isn't a bad choice. At least in the past, sticking to LIBOR/SARON was the cheapest option on average. But of course, if you can't handle the risk of rate increases, you shouldn't do it. (One option to reduce the risk is to pay the difference between SARON and the current fixed rates onto a dedicated savings account.) But of course, if had gotten the chance to get a <1% 15-year deal, I'd have done it :) I'm slightly late to the party.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

paulcole 3y ago

I'm American and I've never felt the appeal of homeownership. In fact for me the opposite has been true. I see it as something I want to avoid. I just don't see any of the upsides that so many people seem to. It's unfortunate (for me) that owning a home is some key component of the American Dream. I see so many people who prioritize owning a home over everything else and it just doesn't make a ton of sense to me. The more people who see renting for life as a great option, the better our society would be, IMO. Renting currently has disadvantages too (nothing's perfect), but I think a lot of people would have higher quality of life if they looked beyond home ownership. Think about all the people who claim they wish they didn't have to drive so much and how they wish they could walk more. They could easily do this if they hadn't bought a house in the suburbs! Rent a small apartment and walk wherever you want. It's great! Another interesting article from the NYT on the topic of renting for life: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/23/magazine/vienna-social-housing.html https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/23/magazine/vienna-social-ho...

xormapmap 3y ago
> I just don't see any of the upsides that so many people seem to. The way I see it I'm going to be paying a mortgage either way. I'd rather it be my own than my landlord's.
- paulcole 3y ago
  Why exactly? I'm fine with paying for someone else to own the roof over my head. I've just prioritized keeping that cost as low as possible so I can do other things with my money.
  - MattPalmer1086 3y ago
    I can see two main reasons. When the mortgage is paid off: 1) you own a valuable asset. 2) your cost of living falls dramatically.
    - paulcole 3y ago

mrazomor 3y ago

I lived in places where renting is unregulated/not protected, and in the places where it's well regulated. IMO, being able to do a long term and safe rent is the biggest win for the financial planning and personal finance you can get: - people can become independent as soon as they find their first job (living with a roommate is an option to get a bigger place -- valid even for decades if that fits ones lifestyle) - high personal wealth liquidity (invest in financial markets, move to a cheaper place if the situation asks for it, move to a bigger place if the family grows) - if the place that costs 2M to buy, an be rented for 3k, that's 50y of rent! (or even more, as the maintenance, tax & mortgage cost outperform the rent increase, not to mention a loss from not investing that money) and, think how the place will look after 50y... But the renting must be very well regulated -- to make it a comfortable living. That's something worth (politically) fighting for. (a happy renter)

Pet_Ant 3y ago
I mean if you have regular safe long-term rental, then it shifts the burden onto the landowner. It means the don't make much in good times, and if there is a drought in terms of demand (plant closures, surplus building) they are left holding the bag. Really, the answer is for things that need a delicate balance to be handled by an arms-length public corporation.

anotherhue 3y ago

Now price in the negative non-financial aspects of renting: * Inability to make changes to the building * Constant fear of eviction for the flimsiest of reasons * No tax reduction on rent payments (but often on mortgage interest - a gobsmacking reality) * Arbitrary rules imposed on you long beyond your childhood years: Pets/no pets, smoking/no smoking, rug surface area requirements etc.

paulcole 3y ago
As a lifelong renter: > Inability to make changes to the building Who cares? What are you people dreaming of doing to buildings? I sleep, watch TV, shower, and cook dinner in my apartment. Doesn't take a lot to satisfy me, I guess. > Constant fear of eviction for the flimsiest of reasons A good argument for governmental protection of renters. > No tax reduction on rent payments (but often on mortgage interest - a gobsmacking reality) Don't care. My rent is so much lower than a mortgage that I don't mind missing out on the tax benefits. > Arbitrary rules imposed on you long beyond your childhood years: Pets/no pets, smoking/no smoking, rug surface area requirements etc. There's arbitrary rules imposed on nearly every aspect of modern life. I'm not particularly bothered by a few more.
- anotherhue 3y ago
  Windows not keeping in the heat or not keeping out the noise? Too bad, can't replace them. Air conditioner lacks any airflow in leading to huge CO2 levels? Too bad, you get the same one everyone gets. Electrical outlets in insane places? Tough. Take zero baths a year but still need to stand in one? Too bad, no real shower for you.
  - dbrgn 3y ago
    Hah, previous place ticks 3 out of 4 bulletpoints :) We didn't have an air conditioner, but thanks to leaky windows, CO2 buildup was not an issue.
  - paulcole 3y ago
    Yeah I mean those are frustrations for sure. Nothing’s perfect and it’s certainly not worth spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on a house to fix to me.

frank_bb 3y ago

[dead]

expertentipp 3y ago

Just emigrate to save for buying your home like everyone does, dummy Swiss! For example to a comet and once you collect enough rhodium and iridium, you're good to go... or stay there, it is likely cheaper than in Switzerland.

swah 3y ago

Wouldn't remote work improve this somehow? I guess everyone still wants to live in the best places instead of driving 30 minutes to the good supermarket...

saturn_vk 3y ago
Housing prices in rural areas in Switzerland aren't much more affordable. And that's usually where people buy, because almost no one can afford prices in the big cities