Applying for a Swiss apartment: what they may ask, and what they may not

The subletting law you have read about did not happen

On 24 November 2024 Swiss voters rejected the amendment to Article 262 of the Code of Obligations by 51.6 percent to 48.4, and rejected the parallel own-use amendment by 53.8 to 46.2. Both had passed Parliament in September 2023 and were defeated by referendum.

Article 262 is unchanged. There is no written-consent requirement, no two-year maximum, no 30-day termination rule. A great deal of content published in 2024 describes those as current Swiss law, and the Federal Housing Office's own explanatory page still describes the proposals in the present tense without carrying the result — so you can land on an official domain and be misled.

The one-third rule is not law

No provision of the Code of Obligations and no federal ordinance sets an income-to-rent ratio. It is landlord underwriting custom, nothing more. The only official touchpoint is in data protection: a landlord is permitted to ask about the ratio between rent and income. That is permission to ask, not a legal threshold.

This matters in a way that is easy to miss. Because it is not law, there is no appeal against a rejection based on it. Anyone telling you Swiss law requires rent under a third of income is inventing a statute.

You must propose one replacement tenant, not three

Article 264 paragraph 1 requires a single qualifying candidate to end a lease early. The tenants' association confirms only one must be proposed, and recommends offering several purely as tactics. “You must propose three” is folklore, and it is the most common English-language error on this subject.

Propose in writing by registered post. The landlord gets a reasonable checking period: ten to twenty days for professional management, up to thirty for a private landlord. So propose at least a month before your intended handover, because the checking window alone can cost you a month's rent.

The right almost no English page mentions

Under Article 270 paragraph 2, cantons facing a housing shortage may require the landlord to disclose, on an official cantonal form, what the previous tenant paid, plus the reference interest rate and price index that applied. That gives you the factual basis to challenge your own initial rent under Article 270 paragraph 1, within 30 days of taking possession, before the conciliation authority.

It is in force canton-wide in Zurich, Geneva, Basel-Stadt, Bern, Lucerne and Zug, and in Vaud it covers the districts of Lausanne, Ouest lausannois, Morges, Nyon, Lavaux-Oron, Riviera-Pays d'Enhaut, Broye-Vully, Gros-de-Vaud and Jura-Nord vaudois, but not Aigle.

If you sign a lease in any of those places, you have a right to know the previous rent and thirty days to challenge yours. That is money in your pocket, and leaving it out of a guide is a substantive failure.

What a landlord may not ask you

The process is legally two-stage, and this matters enormously: everyone submits a form for an advertised flat, and only once you are shortlisted may the landlord request supporting documents. The data protection authority is explicit that demanding full documentation from every applicant is disproportionate.

Expressly impermissible: membership of a tenants' association; existing chronic illnesses; an interest in a tied transaction such as an insurance contract with the property manager; and — by a Federal Data Protection Commission decision of 28 August 2003 — your current rent and current tenancy duration. Civil status and religion are generally not permissible either, and nationality beyond the Swiss-or-foreign and permit questions is not permissible at first selection.

An identity or permit copy may only be requested once you are finally chosen and the lease is being drawn up. References may not be taken systematically — only from candidates genuinely in contention, only from people you named, and only to confirm what is on the form.

After the lease is signed, the landlord must destroy unsuccessful applicants' forms and every annex, expressly including copies of debt extracts.