Editorial on the second home challenge: Don’t bother with your own holiday home

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There’s a pretty reliable rule of thumb circulating among online journalists: If a story is about real estate, it will be read. It seems that the Swiss public can be divided into two halves: homeowners and those who want to own a home.

Seen this way, the dream of owning your own home is a truly Swiss affair, and we can easily explain it in terms of kitchen psychology: Despite all the negativities in the world, your own four walls offer the highest level of security. Especially since land represents a solid value as a particularly scarce commodity in small states.

The longing for a second home lies even deeper in the soul of the nation: in this country private Alpine réduit is considered the highest happiness of middle-class existence. Thoughts are free, but the mind strives for walls, and prosperity does not lead to a great urge to emerge, but instead to a retreat into small things, as immortalized in Mozart’s “The Magic Flute”: “Oh, a mouse, how I would like to hide! If I were as small as a snail, I would crawl into my house!”

Like every myth, the Swiss dream of owning your own home has an illogical side: everyone who belongs to the middle class and knows mathematics should give up owning their own holiday home; As every expert knows, this is not financially worthwhile.

Instead, book nice hotel rooms or rent a spacious apartment for your holiday: your expenses for this are still lower than for owning your own home; For this you also have to pay tradesmen, electricians, other maintenance costs and – above all – costs. taxes. This will also help you avoid the pressure of constantly going to the same place. If you are unfaithful about the holiday home you have purchased, you will avoid the additional expense of renting it to someone else. You also save yourself from the not insignificant risk of an inheritance dispute.

In short: Unless you belong to the upper class, you should forget about the idea of ​​a private second home. However, when it comes to real estate, the Swiss think differently.

Source :Blick