Apartment hunting in Zürich
Since we are all registered and have a bank account now, we have started to look for an apartment to rent. The last time that we were apartment hunting was way back in 1998, so not only are we totally out of practice but we are in a foreign country with a bit of a language barrier. Again, lucky for us we have the assistance of a relocation company to hold our hands and walk us through the entire process. They have a neat web interface where we can look at the properties we’re interested in and indicate to the agent what we’d like to do. She will then find out when we can go see it and make the appointment or tell us when the open house will be. She will even go with us if we need someone to help with communication.
Our first appointment was at the apartment that the agent has been really talking up. Turns out, she knows the owner and knows that the situation would be good as far as the comforts of the building. There are things about apartment life here that we just haven’t encountered in the US, like quality of windows to keep out street noise, quality of the entrance for security purposes, storage space in the basement, availability of washer/dryer in some buildings, and the schedule for the Waschmaschine which is a Very Big Deal. It’s either written in stone, or privately agreed to between the tenants. Some buildings may have no Waschmaschine schedule at all, and that is usually noted in the listing description. Just don’t violate the Waschmaschine rules and you won’t have any problems.
At the weekend, we took the opportunity to go ride around the neighborhood where we’ve requested to view the most houses, District 2. I took a few pictures to try to help me remember the surroundings of each listing. The last couple of pictures are of the viewing that we did on Saturday. It’s an old building (1897) that was refurbished completely a few years ago. The owner lives on the top 3 floors, so there are only 2 tenants that share the common areas. It was well done and the neighborhood is nice, but old buildings mean small everything - that was the biggest con for this one. Also, somehow our agency gave us 2 different times for the viewing appointment and we showed up at the wrong time, so the nice tenant who was Italian and had a wife, a naked toddler, and an infant, showed us around instead of the agent. Awkward, but he was very nice about it.
Today we went to our 4th showing. It was an open house in District 4, right by the city center. This was our 2nd open house, and so far they have been quite interesting. We are usually given instructions that say go ring the bell and do as instructed. Usually they give us instructions in (fast) German, and we have to ring a couple of times to get them to say them in English. Once we were left to wait until someone came downstairs to take us up in small groups, and the other time we were told to go up to the 4th floor and go through the open door. I’m sure this is all due to Covid, but it’s still very strange to me. Both times the tenants have been the ones hosting the open house. They show you around the apartment and tell you all the details. They’ll also include stuff that they’re willing to leave behind if you’re interested in buying it - like shelving units, wardrobes, light fixtures. One guy told us he had spent 800 CHF on can lights for his unit that he was willing to sell to the next tenant. That’s another thing, ceiling lights. They are rare. And if they have ceiling lights, a lot of them have been just a light bulb hanging from a wire in the ceiling.
Those are my observations, but like I said we’re only 4 showings in. Definitely not experts, and still learning the whole process. We did submit an application for the apartment we saw today. I don’t really know what to expect - I’ve heard that it’s a total crap shoot to be chosen as a tenant. They might reject us because we’re American, or because we’re old (sort of), or because of any number of very specific, subjective things. There is some element of first-come-first-served, but they can be as choosy as they want. Fun times.
The meal pictured was at Mythos Restaurant, which is in District 4. We had lunch there before the open house. It’s halloumi cheese with pita and tomato. Quite interesting and very salty cheese.
Prost!