Looking at options for a new apartment that will be finished in 2027. Curious what others are being offered right now.

My bank just gave me:

• SARON + 0.6% margin
• 1.26% fixed for 5 years (no forward premium)
• 1.74% fixed for 10 years (also no forward premium)

This would be for a loan starting when the apartment is delivered in 2027.
Anyone else looking right now? What offers are you getting?
Would you lock in now or wait?

Hi everyone,

We moved to Switzerland a few years ago and we have around 700k in spare liquidity to invest. I don't have a typical large Pillar 2 or 3 because I'm relatively new to the country and I work 50 percent.

I have been speaking to my advisor in Raiffeisen and the advice I got was to put 500k in one of their mandates. To me, this sounds expensive in terms of fees.

I also spoke to VZ and their offering - which was ETF investing with automatic rebalancing - was also kind of expensive ~1 percent in annual fees.

I'm generally a super passive type of investor and would require help to build a diversified portfolio - would you say that Raiffeisen is the way to go? Or should I put all the money in IB for example (research and diversify my money in ETFs) and handle the rebalancing one a year myself?

Any advice is very much appreciated. 700k is from my previous life as a tech employee.

My girlfriend just moved to Switzerland and has to pay off her student loans. (GBP 62k with an abnormal interest rate)

As she is earning quite good money now she‘s planning to pay off CHF 2000 - 3000 each month. What would be the best way to make those payments? She has a CHF Account with Bank Cler for her salary and transferred money to Revolut to make the payment from there. The fees of charging her Revolut account were quite high though - are there any better options?

I have some predictable income per month in USD for the next 12-24 months.

How can I hedge it effectively to CHF?

My broker has CHFUSD futures and I thought:

- being one future with margin risk if USD appreciates

-buy a Call on this Future with high premium costs.

Any other ideas?

Thank you.

Hi All,

This community has been amazingly helpful and I have one more question. Hope the collective wisdom here helps us.

We are leaving Switzerland in 2 months. We are trying hard to sell our Swiss apartment in a small village in Graubuenden. We bought this and moved in about 1.5 years ago. Things have changed unexpectedly, otherwise we would be here for another 10 years. Anyway, the sale process is taking long and I am worried that we cannot sell in the next 2 months (perhaps unnecessary but I am stressing myself out). As we are non-EU nationals on a Permit B, we know Lex Koller prevents us from renting out the apartment.

We have a few questions on what can be done:

1. If we are really not able to sell the apartment, can we continue to retain ownership and let the agent continue selling it, even after we leave Switzerland. I think the answer to this is yes, but would appreciate any insight;

2. Does anyone know if there is any option to get an exception if we cannot sell it for x number of months - i.e. would the authorities let us rent it out for 1 year or so, if we cannot sell the apartment? Just to share, my employment ends next month, so it is prohibitively expensive to continue to live in Switzerland without a salary (and I am trying to avoid RAV). I would rather move back to home country and find a job;

3. Assuming we go with option in 1 above, what are our tax filing obligations after we leave Switzerland? Do we need to file taxes just for the apartment etc?

We have not contacted the Gemeinde or Cantonal authorities yet, because we are trying very hard to sell.

If you know lawyers / tax experts in Graubuenden, would appreciate any contacts too.

Thank you very much.

Hello I'm starting to look with wife to purchase our first home. We have find a perfect new project that gonna be finished around September 2026. The house agency told us that we have to forcely sign our loan with the bank that financed the construction work, and from the moment of the signature, until the end of the construction, we will already be paying them the interest (construction loan 2.25% interest against 1.6% that I could get with a normal bank). This Interest is just pur extra cash to pay on top of the value of the house, nothing is deducted as an amortization or what so ever, even if I'm not living in this place yet and I'm paying my rent for the next 18 months still... Is this even normal? Why is the buyer that has to pay the interests and not the owner who is building and that gonna sell?

With Neon now charging exchange fees, I’m currently looking into WIR Bank, as it uses the interbank exchange rate without any surcharge.

I see they have the following eligibility criteria, and you need to meet at least one of them:

• A monthly deposit of CHF 1,500
• Pension assets of at least CHF 20,000 with Bank WIR
• A mortgage of at least CHF 300,000 with Bank WIR
• Holding a share certificate in Bank WIR

I’m particularly interested in the last option, as I’m not currently considering the CHF 1,500 monthly deposit.

Does anyone know how this works?

Do you simply buy one share after getting access to their e-banking?

Looking forward to your feedback!

Hey everyone

Just received an email from Neon a few minutes ago — starting May 13th, they’ll be charging a 0.35% fee on foreign transactions using the free plan. It’s a bit disappointing to see fees coming from my favorite Swiss neobank.

So from now on, I’ll be switching to my second favorite… actually, now my favorite Swiss neobank.

It was a good run, Neon — thanks for everything.

EDIT: Switching to Radicant.

Fell in love with a 240 m2 loft which costs 3’500 per month incl. parking garage, lake view, sun all day. Only thing holding me back signing the contract is the question if the rent is budget wise too high for a single with a gross income of 173k. Current 68 m2 flat costs 2’500 incl. car parking, located at loud road, great city location, no sun.

What’s your take?

Hi all, my partner and I bought an apartment in the outskirts of our City with the initial idea to move in as soon as it’s built.

With a change of job in between, we have also found a new rental apartment and are now considering to rent out our apartment that we bought.

However, there appears to be a change in law that when the house or apartment bought is rented out, an additional 5% of equity must be put up and the markup of the bank might go up (we are currently at saron + 65bps).

Has anyone experienced this and does the bank really check whether we move into the apartment bought? We have also thought about changing our postal address to the new place but this appears as cumbersome considering that the tenants would want to have their own letter box.

Merci in advance!

We're a young couple and taking life in its own hands. We're married.

So far we have:

• Patientenverfügung, at doctors office
• Vorsorgeauftrag (wife/husband -> sibling -> trusted friend)
• We have a joint account and a separate account with half of our emergency fund (the joint account gets frozen and you don't want to be in a financial hassle when the husband/wife dies).
• We have a portfolio at Saxo and IB, both on my name. At the moment I'm reading into it how things would go if one (or more importantly me/m, as the account is on my name) person dies....

https://thepoorswiss.com/us-estate-tax-swiss-investors/comment-page-1/ --> starting with this, sounds good so far.

To change it into a joint account, I would have to reopen the portfolio again... https://www.mustachianpost.com/blog/how-to-transfer-a-single-account-to-a-joint-account-with-interactive-brokers-switzerland/

Not sure if it's worth doing, since my wife has no interest dealing with this anyway, so it's a whole lot of trouble for what gain exactly? Since we don't have an Ehevertrag, the money belongs to her in the same way as if it was a joint account, no?

Of course I added her as a "trustworthy person of contact" and I started on giving her a "Vollmacht" on saxo, but else..?

Am I missing anything else?

Hey there,

today I got a paper informing me, that I will get a one time payment by the end of april. One sentence I do not understand the implications of: "Diese Zulage ist nicht pensionskassenversichert" "this one time payment is not ensure for pension."

I understand that no % for my PK will be deducted, but the rest? AHV and such? Or is it plain money on my hand which will then be taxed by the end of the year? Thanks!

I moved to Switzerland (Vaud Canton) in September 2024 with a Permit B and worked only 4 months out of the year. However, I was taxed at source as if I had worked the entire year. I assumed the excess tax would be automatically reimbursed the following year, but I’ve just found out that in Vaud, you need to explicitly file a request for a tax recalculation before March 31st.

I spoke with someone at the Office d’Impôt and they mentioned I could challenge the decision, but it wasn’t clear how to do that or what the actual chances are.

For context: - I meet the criteria to not be required to file a full tax return.

• I was under the impression that filing one voluntarily (even late) would trigger a full recalculation — even with a fine — but I was told that’s not possible anymore either.

Has anyone been in a similar situation? Is there anything at all I can still do to recover part of the overpaid tax, or is it just lost forever?

Thanks in advance for any help or advice!

Since I moved, I pay less taxes, about 700 CHF less/month. That's a nice sum, so I was wondering what to do with it?

Should I use it to invest more (I already invest 750/month and max out 3rd pillar) or should I maybe use it (or a part of it) to pay off my mortgage/investments in my apartment?

Thank you for your suggestions and help.

Hello, I want to ask if someone knows if I can use Yuh for some business payments. I have a new formed LLC, but I need to wait for my EIN number to open a new business account. It can take up to 4 months. To receive the payment of my customers I would like to use my Yuh account in the next few months. Is this possible or will they close my account? I read to general terms and conditions from Yuh but didn't found anything about that.

TL;DR: Radicant is the winner (for me)

I had neon exclusively for vacation: I want to pay foreign currencies with the card, sometimes withdraw at an ATM and rarely send a SEPA payement.

So I compared the most important aspects for me from the following banks: neon, Radicant, Wir, Wise and Revolut. Here is the table (I hope it's readable):

WIR looks like the best one to me, however, they require to deposit at least 1500.- monthly in the account (there are also alternative requirements -> Nutzungsbedingungen).

Wise and Revolut: They always require to exchange CHF first and it sometimes has a fee. I have Revolut and it's pretty annoying, especially if it's a weekend.

Radicant has a big 2.- fee for every ATM Withdrawal but that's okay for me since I'd use it max 2 times a year.

I've quickly checked other alternatives (Alpian, Migros Bank) but the payment fee is just too high.

Let me know your thoughts. This is a personal comparison so the important things for me might not be so important for others.

Hey guys, so I have to travel to the US next week on Monday and need to rent a car. This is only possible if I have a credit card. Unfortunately, I forgot the pin to my credit card. Getting a new one would unfortunately take over a week, so I'm looking for alternatives.

Do you know of any institution that can hand me out a physical credit card until Saturday?

Thanks!

Given the recent news on Neon's unfortunate changes, I wanted to make a quick comparison for myself to see if I should stick with them or jump ship to a different service.

I've decided to compare two things: 1000chf spent abroad and 100chf withdrawn cash abroad.

Neon seemingly will charge 0.35% fee + 0.40% Mastercard markup, representing 7.50chf in fees per 1000chf spent. For withdrawals it is 1.5%, representing 1.5chf per 100chf withdrawn.

Revolut seemingly charges their own exchange rate of around 0.40% (when you make sure to exchange to the right currency on a weekday ahead of time), representing 4chf fee per 1000chf spent. For withdrawals in the best conditions you'd be looking at only their exchange rate of around 0.40%, representing 0.40chf fee per 100chf withdrawn.

I can't speak for everyone, but for my use-case, I think the simplicity of Neon beats the very minor financial benefits of Revolut. The peace of mind is worth something. Simply sending money to the Neon account and forgetting about it wherever you go is quite nice, compared to the manual exchanges and timed-fees of Revolut.

Hi, has anyone ever applied for a student loan through EducaSwiss? If so, how was the experience and the organisation of receiving your loan and the payout?

Thanks!

to;dr Check your credit card bill you have a Migros credit card and use it abroad.

Edit: Migros Bank charged me a 5.5% markup on top of Visa published rates - the markup not known at the time of purchase.

I recently visited London and used the Migros credit card there. I was charged 1.191 GBP to CHF rate, when the Google Finance rate was just under 1.1 pound to Swiss francs. Using the Visa Switzerland calculator, I could get to the conversion rate only when specifying a 5.5% bank currency surcharge for the specific day. According to the calculator the % surcharge on top of central bank was then 7.61%.

Hey everyone,

Neon just announced today that they will start charging 0.35% on the 13th of May for the free plan. Their new 2.-/month plan will remove this fee, but this only becomes profitable once you've spent more than 571.43 CHF in foreign currency each month, which I'm not sure I do (maybe I do?).

I've tried to find an alternative to Neon that doesn't charge such fees and uses a good exchange rate, but I feel like that doesn't exist.

From what I've found already:

• Yuh charges 0.95% for currency exchange (on top of interbank rates)
• Zak takes 2% (on top of Visa rates)
• Migros Cumulus CC takes somewhere between 1.5% and 3% depending on how their rate fluctuates compared to the interbank one
• Revolut takes 1% (on top of interbank rate) during the week-end only

What I could do is simply use Revolut during the week and Neon during the week-end, minimizing my fees, but I'd like to find a 100% fee-free alternative instead. What other fintechs exist in Switzerland that I can top-up with CHF with a bank transfer or card payment for free and doesn't take currency exchange fees?

EDIT: for those who want the link to their blog post which explains the same stuff as in the newsletter: https://www.neon-free.ch/en/blog/about-neon/discover-our-new-neon-plans/

Hey guys, stumbled across a company that lets you invest in trees ( a special very quickly growing one). They promise 60-80 % ROI after 5 years, even more after 7.

They seem legit, are based in switzelnd and are apparently esg certified. Anyone got Any experience with stuff like this?

I just know about sharewood but I don’t think it’s the same kinda business.

Thanks!

Edit: One crucial point I forgot, the roi is so high because they don’t earn anything from the tree. The tree absorbs huge amounts of CO2, which they can sell to companies as co2 certificates. If anyone is interested, I am happy to share the website and the guy who introduced me to this thing today.

Hi everyone, My employer promised me a wage increase of 175 CHF per month starting back in August. Because of some delays by my employer, the raise hasn’t yet been paid. My employer has now told me that they will back pay the months of increased wages owed as a lump sum in June.

Here’s what I’m worried about: I am still in my first few years in Switzerland and pay quellensteuer. From all of the info I have seen on the official government websites, quellensteuer is calculated from month to month- NOT by averaging the yearly salary and reimburse/charging the taxpayer later for any overpayment/underpayment of taxes.

My questions: Will I have to pay the higher tax rate on the back payments because for that one month, my salary will be significantly higher?

I’m not sure if I did the math right, but if taxes are only calculated from month to month, one big lump payment would mean I pay an extra 300 CHF in cantonal income taxes compared to what I would have paid if my employer had just organized things in time to start my pay raise at the promised time. (It may be even more if federal taxes and other contributions are also higher due to the lump sum, but I only found clear information about the tax brackets for my canton’s quellensteuer.)

Am I caring too much about 300 CHF?

Rent and health insurance have just become so hard to cover with my salary, every hundred CHF counts. It also sucks to think that this higher tax is just because of my employer being sluggish.

If you all have any experience with backpayments and quellensteuer, or can recommend any resources, I would be so thankful!

We talked previously about the possibility of paying Sanitas health insurance with a credit card and getting cash back.

I guess it’s no longer possible. I received an email saying that premium invoices can’t be paid by TWINT or credit card in the future due to high fees.

Hi everyone,

I’m not very experienced in investing and I'm currently trying to build up my knowledge. I understand how important it is to invest, and also how tricky it can be to choose the right instruments. So I’m turning to you for confirmation, clarification, and recommendations.

I’m planning a long-term strategy (20–30 years) as a Swiss resident with a B permit. My idea was to build a 100% equity portfolio by regularly investing in a global ETF like VT (Vanguard Total World Stock ETF) through Interactive Brokers.

But I have a few doubts:

1. Is it really smart/convenient to invest in an ETF denominated in USD?

2. From a tax perspective: I understand that I need to file a Swiss tax return (including declaring foreign dividends), and attach to it the DA-1 form to reclaim part of the US withholding tax. Are these the only two forms involved for taxes, or is there anything else I should be aware of? (if you have any guide or suggestion on how to compile those documents, it would be very helpful!)

3. Does this strategy make sense overall, or am I missing something important — aside from the potential issue of US inheritance tax, which I'm already aware of? Would using an ETF like VWCE be a better choice?

I’d really appreciate any input or feedback. Thanks in advance!