Buying Property in Switzerland as an American

Arielle Tucker (00:01.162)

Picture the average American family landing in Switzerland. The moving boxes are still crossing the Atlantic. The kids need to start school in a few weeks, and everyone assumed finding a home would be the easy part. It rarely is. Switzerland is in the middle of one of the tightest housing markets in Europe, and when a family lands in those first few months, temporary or permanent, can end up shaping their entire relocation. Which is exactly why I brought in today's guest, Uskar. He helps.

Families navigate this. He's founded the Swiss agency and its expat brand, the Swiss Expat Realtor, a Zurich-based team of former expats helping international families navigate home buying, immigration paperwork, and school placement across Zurich, Zouk, Schweiz, and Basel. Uzgar, welcome to the show.

Özgür Ogulkanmis (00:50.626)

Thank you very much, Ariel, for having me.

Arielle Tucker (00:54.4)

Okay, so I'm really curious. can you talk to us about I know you have two companies, can you talk to us a bit about your companies and why you decided to actually focus on serving the expat market and Americans specifically?

Özgür Ogulkanmis (01:08.504)

So I grew up in Switzerland and in my previous career I traveled a lot. I used to work in the also used to live in Switzerland. My partner and co-founder, Evelyn, she's from Singapore. We moved back to Switzerland in 2022. She was in many expert groups, many expert communities and one of the hottest topics that has been discussed is about housing in Switzerland.

and many other questions. So we saw this opportunity to create the first brand Swiss expat's realtor. And this is where we served to relocate our clients moving from abroad, including US to Switzerland. And from there, there were also requests from clients who have been here for a few years maybe and want to purchase a property. And then we created the brand, the Swiss Agency Immobilian.

So basically what we are offering to our clients is we combine our experience being experts abroad and also me growing up in Switzerland combining these both worlds to offer the best possible services for our clients. So for.

Arielle Tucker (02:20.851)

When you first meet with American families who want to either move into Switzerland or maybe are preparing to buy in Switzerland, like what are some of the common misconceptions that you sometimes have to unwind for them?

Özgür Ogulkanmis (02:36.142)

For the American families when they first come to Switzerland, their expectations, their belief is that we can organize five to ten viewings in one day, go visit them, choose the apartment that we want, sign and it's a done deal. Unfortunately, the Swiss market has a very unique way. The whole process is completely different and...

In Switzerland, would say you don't choose the apartment, the landlords choose you as their tenant. And there is a whole process behind it, the way the whole thing works, especially the application process, where you have to disclose a lot of information, where you have to have a lot of documents ready, proper application and so on. And also the decision process is much longer. Landlords, agencies take their time to provide.

their feedback. So it's a completely, I would say, Swiss way of applying for an apartment to get it as controversy of many other countries where you just go and sign and get the lease.

Arielle Tucker (03:40.574)

Yeah. I I remember live we were used to live in Boston and you would just you would go, you would have a real estate agent, they would take you to the leasing office at a couple different apartments, and you would pick where you wanted to live. And it wasn't really that complicated. And I know for our own family moving into Switzerland, it was very difficult. and we ended up finding our first apartments in Switzerland through

friends and connections who were like leaving. So being in that expat circle became really important for us. but that first apartment we got, I mean, I remember we had to stand in lines to go and view these apartments because that was our budget, right? We were looking at the cheaper, you know, two bedroom apartments when we were in our twenties in Switzerland. and you had to stand in line. And culturally, I mean, that was just so different for me to have to like stand in line with 50 other people who wanted the same apartment and you all have your, you know, your documents.

And I'm hoping what we'll talk a little bit about today is that Swiss, like that dossier that you need to apply for an apartment, because that is so unique. And if you have never experienced that living in the US, the questions that they ask you, I'm pretty sure are illegal in the US. so can we actually talk a little bit about what how you even think about applying for a house or apartment? Or and we're talking about rentals right now. So if you're coming here and you're renting, how do you even think about applying?

Özgür Ogulkanmis (05:04.174)

Yes, I mean, this is what you are describing is very usual and imagine you have this 40, 50 people on the line and then these applications come to the tenant and to the landlord and the landlord should select one of these. So therefore it's extremely important that you're, I mean, you're very lucky that you found through your friends at home. Otherwise, it's really extremely important to have a proper, complete

application and sometimes I joke with my clients to say that in Switzerland applying for a home is like applying for a citizenship. They want to know so many information and so many documentation and so on. And this is where we come in and help and especially our one of our jobs is to create this trust to say that if you have 50 applicants and you should choose exactly our client is our job to create this trust to make sure that.

that the landlord can pick you. And this is where we, of course, use also the local language, knowing Swiss German and so on. Even this helps. So there are many different ways that we try to make things happen for our clients.

Arielle Tucker (06:14.535)

I think that's a really good point. We have moved into other really popular r tight real estate markets. So we lived in Berlin, we lived in Munich, we paid back to Switzerland and we hired professional help because we realized as Americans, even with our reference letters, our job applications, our you know, statement of no debt, like we no a a letter describing who our family is, pictures of our family.

Right. We understood the game and still we knew it was gonna be really hard to find to secure permanent housing in the towns that we wanted to live in. so we were still hiring professional support because what you just said I think is really underestimated. Is if you have a separate relationship with the real estate company or the landlord and you've put in other good tenants and you've vetted your tenants when they are going through that stack of fifty applications.

they are gonna be so overwhelmed. I mean, who do they pick? And everyone looks good enough, you know, on on paper. That relationship is is really important.

Özgür Ogulkanmis (07:24.728)

That's a very good point. This is really one of the things that if you hire a professional that can help you because we have long term relations with these agencies, with these property managers and so on. They're also very happy if we bring them clients that we vetted before that we checked everything out and they can rely on this. So this is certainly one of the positive things that they appreciate very much and they are in the position to take our clients then.

maybe some other applications.

Arielle Tucker (07:56.18)

And I'm also curious, are you seeing in in in your in your firm, are people just coming directly to you with off market apartments that already have been going up onto the websites because they're like, Look, we know we're gonna be so inundated with applications, it's too stressful. Just find us a good tenant and we'll take that one. It what are you seeing?

Özgür Ogulkanmis (08:18.83)

Absolutely. have and we have many landlords, especially also private ones who come directly to us because they think that for their home, having an expert as a tenant is the right choice. So they come to us to say that, hey, I have here this beautiful home with this and this good area. Can you do you have any clients? Even they go a step further to say that, can you help us to find the tenant? Because on the other hand, are

We are dealing in the expert world. are in many different communities. We have access with our brand to experts. So off-market is a big topic. Of course, it depends also on in which price range we are talking about. yes, we even have a community of relocation or the relocation agents and real estate agents that we have created a WhatsApp off-market group where we also use as a platform.

to source for our clients of market homes.

Arielle Tucker (09:20.849)

Okay. And what are you seeing with your clients and within the community? Are you seeing that individuals are able to land permanent housing right away, or are you f s are they oftentimes going into temporary housing and then they're like actively looking for that permanent place?

Özgür Ogulkanmis (09:36.91)

So Ariel, I would say this is almost also a misconception. You read a lot that you need to first go into a temporary housing and then you look for a permanent house and so on. think certainly this is a very good approach because in Switzerland, before you can do anything, you need to be registered and for registration, you need to have a home. So temporary housing logically makes very much sense.

because the entry barrier is much less than having a permanent home. However, for our clients, usually say, I would say over 80 % of our clients, we make sure that they get a permanent house before going into the temporary housing. we use them. This is really our core competence, right? So we really make, we use the temporary housing as a backup plan. Of course it happens if we can't find anything then.

Arielle Tucker (10:17.33)

eighty percent. Wow.

Özgür Ogulkanmis (10:30.626)

we looked at as a backup plan. What we want to avoid, especially with families, families with kids and so on, we want to avoid that they go into some temporary housing. First of all, in Switzerland, the temporary housing are usually very small. And secondly, you don't want that they, you go there and then you have schooling and then you need to change again. so there are a lot of problems coming afterwards. So we tried really to find the long-term and handle the temporary as a backup plan.

Arielle Tucker (10:58.013)

Yeah, okay, that's a really great point. And are you seeing that people are coming in and wanting to be in certain neighborhoods or certain r regions and you can kind of get them into those regions? Or are you seeing are you encouraging people to be very flexible? Like, okay, maybe you want to be in Enge in Zurich near Google, but we're not seeing much on the market at all in Enge. So how about Zurich City? Or how about you know, down the Silver Coast? Like how

Flexible are you kind of preparing clients to be in this housing market?

Özgür Ogulkanmis (11:32.056)

This is a very good point and this is one of the most important, let's say, jobs from us as our, from our consultants to educate the client correctly, to set the right expectations. And, and we usually work with timelines. We say, okay, if we are now looking for an apartment in the next three months or six months, maybe at the beginning, we can go ahead with your wishes where you would like to live and so on. But then along the way, the time gets closer and closer. We have to

think about what about this flexibility. So you have usually two parts of flexibility where you can say, okay, either you increase your budget or like you mentioned earlier, you increase the circle where you would like to live. And I would say for the Americans, it's a bit easier in that sense because they usually

Based on our experience, like to live in the city because Switzerland is normally they come from a bigger cities and so on. So their preference is of course to live within the city Zurich and they're also a bit open along the lake and so on. to sum it up, you hit a very good point without the flexibility. Of course, it would be very tough to find in this very tough market in Switzerland a property within short timelines.

Arielle Tucker (12:51.517)

Yeah. And just to kind of share our own experience, my experience moving back into Switzerland, we moved back four years ago and we knew that the housing market had changed significantly since the first time we'd lived here. so we had an hour radius around where my husband was working in in in Zurich. And we ended up just taking an apartment in a town that we knew we really liked, and then a and then I

was on HomeGate, right? At one of the websites here. And I was checking it every single day. And then a house literally across the street came up for rent. And so we applied. We were one of the first people to apply. We talked to the landlord because I'm like, they're already our neighbors, like and and we got the house. And so I've always thought about kind of Zurich real estate is you have to find something that really works for you. And then you can optimize if you aren't like a

Özgür Ogulkanmis (13:22.413)

Yes.

Özgür Ogulkanmis (13:47.628)

Yes. Yes.

Arielle Tucker (13:49.054)

completely satisfied, you can optimize, you can keep looking. and now we're looking to buy. And so I'm on there every day, I'm looking, we're applying. I know that it's like a long game. And I kind of want to switch over to talking about buying because, you know, for so many Americans, we have this idea, and you know, it's so deep inside of us that we want to own the land underneath our feet. Like that's very important.

And even more so important for Americans building wealth. Like we can't we can't invest in the same way as everyone else can. And so oftentimes it could make sense to hold an asset in Swiss francs. Rent in Switzerland is very high. We live in Zurich. We're living in one of the most expensive, if not most expensive, city in the world. It's very expensive to live here. So if you can buy, it becomes maybe really interesting. Now, you and I both know prices are really high, they're going up higher every year.

And there's not much inventory. in my town of 50,000 people just outside of Zurich, I think there's like one or two houses for sale right now. so there's really not much going on. Can you talk to us a little bit about helping when when should people know that they're they should consider buying, right? It's a little bit different in the US. Our tax incentives in Switzerland are a little bit different. and

Özgür Ogulkanmis (14:54.956)

Yes.

Arielle Tucker (15:12.937)

kind of how do you prepare people to go through that process, which unless you have a very high budget, is gonna be, you know, you are gonna be competing with probably thirty, forty, fifty families for whatever you're trying to buy.

Özgür Ogulkanmis (15:26.338)

Yes, I mean, this is a deep topic, right? And you hit it right, the market even for the purchase is also very tight. So for us, usually based on our experience, the clients come first time, let's say the American client come first time to Switzerland where they may be here for one, two years. And then they start to think about this question. I think purchasing, of course, on the one hand, you have the whole

the whole financial sense and so on. But the other thing is also there are some other components that needs to be considered. One of them is like your time horizon. What's your time horizon living in this country? How long are you going to stay in this country? The other situation is your family situation. Maybe the kids are going to go soon out of the home or you are planning to grow your family. And all these have impact on when is it right time to buy, right?

As you said correctly in Switzerland, the mentality is totally different than it's comparing now with Americans. In Switzerland, we have two-thirds of the people who are renting in Switzerland. in America, I think the mentality is more, okay, if you own it, you made it in that sense. But in Switzerland, one of the reasons why this is like that, that there are many people who are renting is because of also of the stability and of the flexibility that you have as a renter.

Also the laws are quite protective on the renter side. The landlord cannot just terminate your contract or increase as and when they wish the rents and so on. So these are a lot of things that are supporting residents in Switzerland to stay in the rent in that sense.

Arielle Tucker (17:13.043)

Yeah, absolutely. And I think just thinking about Switzerland and really across Europe, renters do have a lot more rights than they do in the US. And I think that is an important consideration. And you also have to flip it on the other side. If you're buying and you're like, you know what, we're gonna 'cause a lot of people do this in the US. You buy a property and then you're like, okay, we can convert it into a rental. But in Switzerland

that thought process, you really have to think through, okay, if I convert this into a rental, what are the rights that my tenants are going to have going forward? And am I willing to deal with that in a different country, in a different language?

And and again, the the the tax incentives and numbers work differently in Switzerland than they do in the US. So it's really important that you do have a longer time horizon, right? Maybe in the US five years makes sense, but here it really doesn't start to make sense till maybe after ten years. so thank you for kind of highlighting some of those issues. The other thing I think that it's important to talk about is

you know, who is even allowed to buy. We're hearing a lot of people who just wanna, you know, see Switzerland as a safe haven. They wanna invest in Swiss property. Can you talk through who can even buy in Switzerland right now?

Özgür Ogulkanmis (18:27.022)

So overall, makes, I would say it makes for many people, if they have the opportunity to buy something in Switzerland, I think it's great opportunity because like you mentioned, Switzerland is quite a stable country and the currency is very strong. So even from wealth diversification point and so on, it makes sense. However, of course, the market is very protected. the very, on a very high level.

In principle, if you don't live in Switzerland, so if you are not a resident in Switzerland and you don't have a valid permit, you are not allowed to buy any residential in Switzerland. have this except there is the exception that if you are not living in Switzerland, you can buy holiday homes in certain areas in Switzerland. I'm not going to talk about these topics more because you had there a great podcast also about this topic with Peter with regards to buying.

vacation homes in Switzerland. So I'm focusing on the residential area. So for the residential area, residential properties, you must live in Switzerland. And then Switzerland makes a big difference between EU EFTA countries and so-called third countries. So US would be a third country. And then the rules for EU EFTA countries are a bit easier. They have better access than the third countries.

Very important that if you are a third country and you live in Switzerland and you have a B permit, you have the right to buy a property to be able to live in it. So if you are a US citizen, are living in Switzerland, you can buy with a B permit a property. But what is very important also the law, the notary also, it's not just...

because you have a B-perm you can buy, also validate the intention of you. Are you going to live long-term in Switzerland? What proves that you are really living in Switzerland? Sometimes you need to even provide that you are purchasing, you are going to do groceries here in Switzerland and that you are maybe part of some local communities and so on. So because the idea is that foreign residents should only be able to buy something in Switzerland.

Özgür Ogulkanmis (20:45.368)

with the intention that they're going to live long term here and that their life is happening in Switzerland.

Arielle Tucker (20:51.229)

Yeah, I'm really glad that you talked about this because a lot of Americans don't realize that we're categorized as third country citizens. So we're really like we kind of have to strive a bit more than if we were just EU, right? So if you're EU it's it's a it's a lot easier. But as third country citizens, a lot of Americans, even when they come here, they might not get a B a B permit or a C permit on their first go. They may end up with an L permit.

that they have for one or two years before it's eventually converted into a B. And then you have to have the B for at least five years plus language, language levels to then get the C permit. So there is this whole process that if you're coming to Switzerland, you have a job, but you don't even have the right visa, you are automatically you can't even consider buying.

Özgür Ogulkanmis (21:39.406)

Correct. Yes. And again, with the L-permitance example, it's getting even more complicated, except you can really provide the evidence to the authorities that you are going to stay here long term, you are going to live here long term. and I mean, as we know that Swiss market is quite a tight market and is also politically a big topic discussions ongoing about the...

property market. maybe there is one more add on that I need to highlight here. There's also this misconception that at the moment, at least that if you own a property, you bought a property and you leave the country, you need to sell the property from a low point of view. There is no law now saying that you have to sell it. So that you can, when you leave the country for what reasons ever, when it's a valid reason and so on, you can keep the property and you can rent it out. So, but

There are political discussions happening and this may change in future.

Arielle Tucker (22:42.525)

Yeah, I think that's a really important point. I know our family, we just had applied for a house to buy around the corner from our house. And we knew the neighbors and we wrote our letter and we had a really good offer. and we heard back from the real estate agent that the family didn't really care about money. They just wanted a Swiss family. And unfortunately, there was nothing we could do at that point. Like we're st we're still we still just have our US passports.

And we weren't the the Swiss family that they were look they're looking for. And it goes back to your point of the landlord or the former owner will choose you. And so starting to develop those relationships with the right, you know, real estate team or locally in your community so that you know when houses are coming up, because we are we do also have an aging population here in Switzerland who owns the the properties, th those important those conversations become so important.

Özgür Ogulkanmis (23:37.368)

Yes. Yes, I mean, this is this is this is these are really very good points that the more relationship a personal relationship you can build with a landlord or with an owner, the higher are your chances. And of course, like you highlighted, working also with local agents who know the market, who have access also to off market and so on. This is this is certainly helping.

Maybe on the permits, one more add on. We have been talking about B and C permits. So if you are a US American and you have a B permit, can literally only buy one residence property that you can live. You cannot buy a second one that you can rent it out. EU, as example, with a B permit, they can do exactly that. They can buy to live in it. They can buy to rent it out. So this shows a little bit the preference or the excess of the EU.

and no, no, you're third countries in Switzerland. If you have a C permit as an American, you are again here equal like anybody else in Switzerland, the Swiss people who can buy to live in it, who can buy to rent it out and so

Arielle Tucker (24:48.979)

Yeah, and those are really good points because we work with a lot of ki clients who are in Zurich. And in Zurich, it's an incredibly tight market. Oftentimes maybe you don't even really want to buy what you see is available, even if you could afford it. And people are like, Well, you know what? We can't really afford to buy, or the property type that we want isn't in Zurich. We would really like to buy, you know, a Shelly out in the mountains. But again, if you have that B permit.

you can't buy a second home. You can only buy a permanent like your your primary residence. And so you really have to think through the timing of when when would you actually be able to buy that property.

Özgür Ogulkanmis (25:28.43)

Correct, yes.

Arielle Tucker (25:30.431)

Okay, Uzgar, I this was such a good conversation. Thank you so much for sharing your insights. Is there any other point that you want to leave our audience with today before we close out?

Özgür Ogulkanmis (25:40.852)

I think on the rental part, if you look at the rental part, it's important that also there that you are able to put up an application into place that is really complete and with all the documents and so on and that helps you on the rental part to maybe probably find the property. On the purchase part, in Switzerland we don't have this typical buyer-seller agent. However,

It makes absolutely sense if you would like to purchase a property in Switzerland that you can work with an agent together who can validate on your behalf the pricing, who can negotiate the deal, who can even go through the whole process. And sometimes if you don't speak enough good enough German, notary does not accept you to sign the purchase contract. So even there it makes sense to fully work with an agent together.

if you want to buy your dream home in Switzerland.

Arielle Tucker (26:41.139)

Yeah, great points. Lizgir, thanks again for joining us today. I really appreciate your sharing your time and expertise.

Özgür Ogulkanmis (26:46.816)

Ariel, thank you very much for this conversation. I appreciate it very much.