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Comment by kleiba | Hacker News Reader

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

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> 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.

> 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.

Property doesn't stop existing when the owner dies. When the owner dies, the property is probably sold soon after, then loan is paid.

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

Afaik Social security companies actually own a lot of properties in switzerland and finance our social system trought this. Also there are quite a lot of cooperatives that own housing and sublet them for very fair prices. Some properties are owned by the state, or companies that are owned mostly by the state such as the sbb (railroad company).

Some statistic about ownership: https://www.bfs.admin.ch/bfs/de/home/statistiken/bau-wohnung...

Also interesting: https://www.bfs.admin.ch/news/de/2022-0072

Translated: For the owner types of rental apartments, there are now cumulative results over three years (2019-2021). They enable analyses at cantonal level and for the six largest cities in Switzerland. At around a quarter (26%), the canton of Geneva had the lowest proportion of rental apartments owned by private individuals. In the cantons of Valais (68%) and Ticino (70%), on the other hand, this proportion was significantly higher. The owner category "Other limited company/ limited liability company/cooperative", which mainly comprises institutional investors such as insurance companies, pension funds or investment funds, accounted for half (50%) of all rental apartments in the canton of Geneva. In the cantons of Valais (23%) and Ticino (21%), on the other hand, less than a quarter of all rental apartments fell into this category. The Swiss average was 33%.

The most detailed table i found: https://dam-api.bfs.admin.ch/hub/api/dam/assets/20784986/mas...

It lists privat, public, Cooperatives, investors, separated investors returning most gains to the public again(social security, insurances, …)

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.

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