Apartment

Upon my return I was greeted to an apartment building covered in scaffolding. Over the next six months or so, our building is being renovated – new paint and shutters on the outside; an upgraded elevator (the current one is comically low-tech – there’s a wooden “safety fence”); and some other miscellaneous work. The attic is also being converted into a few additional apartments.

Here’s the view from our front balcony. It’s definitely a bummer that we’ll have an obstructed view during the best period of the year. And to my knowledge we don’t get any discount for the related inconvenience.

As a result of the renovation, our rent will go up a bit. The rules in Switzerland are pretty strict on this front – landlords can only increase rents by a statutory rate based on interest rates and inflation unless considerable improvements are made. It’ll be interesting to see what the change in rent is as I have absolutely no clue what to expect.