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City people and mountain people live in different worlds. Interdependence is great. The lack of mutual understanding is often even greater. Second home owners in a village in Goms VS wanted the street light to be shortened by one meter because it illuminated the bedroom at night. Blinds or curtains are not an option. After all, you want to enjoy the starry sky.
Another time, holiday apartment owners complained about the noise of the Rhone river flowing rapidly near their apartments. Such feedback causes consternation in communities. General suspicion: That the townspeople are looking for paradise in the mountains. However, they lack understanding of the conditions and problems miners face.
Allianz Second Homes is struggling
Owners of holiday homes often consider themselves robbed. In Pontresina GR, this accusation now takes on a new dimension. The municipality wants to be the first village in Switzerland to introduce a second home tax. Revenue from the tax should be directed towards the construction of affordable first homes.
Heinrich Summermatter (77) can do nothing with this idea. “Such a tax keeps coming. It is very tempting to deceive second home owners and thus improve their financial situation,” says the President of Allianz Second Homes Switzerland.
But he believes this would be completely the wrong approach. On the one hand, the housing shortage has nothing to do with holiday home owners. “We see that many employees in all tourism centers have to migrate to surrounding settlements.” Additionally, holiday home owners are already being asked to pay. “You contribute proportionately to expenses through taxes and fees. “There are no costs left.”
The Valais community made the calculation
But there are doubts in many tourist communities that the bill will work. The municipality of Obergoms VS wanted to have precise information in 2022 and had the calculations made by a consulting company in Zurich. Result: The municipality faces infrastructure costs of 1,067 francs per holiday apartment. “The total deficit of 1.1 million francs allocated to second homes corresponds to 45 percent of direct taxes,” the report states.
This is not taken into account: the high demand for holiday homes during the pandemic has caused property prices in destinations to continue to rise rapidly. At the same time, the Second Homes Act has greatly restricted the construction of new holiday apartments since 2016. For this reason, converting existing apartments into holiday apartments has become much more attractive for investors.
This drives up the prices of older properties, often making them unaffordable for locals in many tourist communities. With a second homes tax, these properties will lose some of their appeal as holiday homes. However, this impact is unlikely to be very large.
In extreme cases there is a risk of trade boycott
The tax may also have negative consequences: “The municipality is shooting itself in the foot with the tax. Second home owners are good customers. This may change if you upset them,” says Heinrich Summermatter. In Silvaplana GR, second home owners have threatened to stop placing orders with local businesses if the planned second home tax is introduced. Municipalities in Valais have also faced boycott threats on several occasions.
The disappointment of many holiday home owners is not unfounded: as of 2015, many cantons adjusted their tourism laws, and municipalities subsequently took advantage of higher tourism taxes from their new coverage; in most cases well above the permissible level. Municipalities wanted to use high fixed prices for holiday apartments to create an incentive for holiday apartments to be rented for as long a term as possible. However, the Federal Court overturned most of the new regulations.
The never-ending debate over tourist taxes
The affected communities have revised the regulations, but in many places holiday flat owners still have to pay a flat rate of several hundred or even a thousand francs a year. The annual cost of a 100 square meter holiday apartment in Arosa GR is 2,600 francs.
The dispute over new regulations in the communities of Aletsch Arena VS or the resort town of Anzère VS has been going on for years. The second home association in Anzère has responded to the recent tourist tax increase announcement with an open letter. It is stated that there is “systematic blackmail of second home owners” to finance tourism policy. The front parts have hardened.
Source :Blick
I’m Tim David and I work as an author for 24 Instant News, covering the Market section. With a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism, my mission is to provide accurate, timely and insightful news coverage that helps our readers stay informed about the latest trends in the market. My writing style is focused on making complex economic topics easy to understand for everyone.
