I’m completely new to the game and seeking advice on optimizing my finances and investments to achieve FIRE as soon as possible. Here’s my situation:
Current Location: Living in Switzerland with a B-permit, planning to stay long-term. Moving back to Norway is not the plan. Still, it could happen in the very distant future (10+ years).
Age and Status: 30, unmarried, no dependents. Recently unemployed, actively applying and networking to find the next role. RAV will start next month at 70% of my previous salary (~CHF 141k annually).
Assumed income/month: CHF 6,411.
Assumed monthly net unemployment allowance, all deductions are taken into consideration.
Total Approximate Monthly Expenses: 5,000 *see budget below
Disposable Income After Expenses: CHF 1,400 per month.
Emergency Fund: CHF 30,000.
Swiss Investments:
Maxed out Pillar 3a contributions over the last three years.
Benefited from a decent Pillar 2 deal with my previous employer.
No other Swiss investments so far.
Norwegian Property:
Apartment valued at approx. CHF 710k, with a CHF 180k mortgage.
Rented out with long-term tenants, generating steady rental income.
The property hasn’t been as profitable as hoped due to unforeseen maintenance costs that owners were required to cover.
Norwegian real estate prices are predicted to grow modestly in the coming years (approx. 2–3% annually).
If sold, I would net approx. CHF 530k after fees and mortgage repayment (no taxes on the sale profits due to residency rules).
Norwegian Emergency Fund: CHF 20,000.
Norwegian Pension: I’ve been contributing to Norway’s pension system (equivalent to Pillar 1-3) since the age of 20, so I have accumulated some retirement savings there.
Goals:
Make the best use of my current assets and income to reduce timeline to FIRE.
Build a diversified, tax-efficient investment portfolio in Switzerland.
Decide on the best course of action for the Norwegian property, including what to do with its rental income if I keep it.
Questions:
If I keep the Norwegian property, where is the best place to reinvest its rental income, considering that I intend to stay in CH?
Given the unforeseen maintenance costs and only moderate market growth predictions for Norwegian real estate, does it make sense to sell the property now?
If I sell, how should I reinvest the proceeds (~CHF 530k) in Switzerland to align with FIRE principles (e.g., ETFs, index funds, real estate)?
How can I best manage my investments in Switzerland while staying flexible in case of a potential move back to Norway in the future?
How can I mitigate long-term currency risks between CHF and NOK?
I’d love your feedback, especially if you’ve navigated cross-border property and investments or pursued FIRE in Switzerland.
Thanks in advance for your insights!
Edit 1 - Unemployment Allowance
Insured Salary (Monthly)
11750,00
Average monthly salary over the last 6 or 12 months
Benefit Percentage
0,70
Gross Daily Allowance
379,62
RAV/Unia use 260 workdays per year for calculations.
Gross Monthly Allowance
8237,65
RAV compensates 21.7 workdays per month on average
The expenses include every foreseeable regular or variable cost I have. The list is exhaustive (e.g. no netflix). Note that I tend to be very conservative/look at worst-case scenarios in terms of budgeting (e.g. electricity and health costs).
Fixed Expenses
Rent: 2,255.00 (for private reasons, flat sharing/relocation is not an option)
This sounds really disproportional, given you are a 1-person household.
Thinking about your expenses is probably Step #1 towards your goal.
Other than that, and given you’re in the real estate already, throwing the remainder into an all world ETF probably makes most sense (until you decide what to do with the property).
As a single (no children to support) and unemployed (have time to do things instead of paying for them) you should spend much less. For example, 50-30-20 budgeting (spend max. 50% on necessary things, max 30% on discretionary and save min. 20% of your income) is a simple formula that everyone, including very busy professionals with children, should manage to follow. I think this is where you should improve significantly! I am sure you can save more than 50% of your income with some painless changes.
Yeah definitely look at optimising Swiss spending.
With a similar salary and a toddler i managed to save 4-5 k monthly invested in etf.
Out of curiosity ,In which bank did you open your 3rd pillar ?
You first need to assess your risk tolerance with next market crash so do not sell and cut your Norwegian real estate and flat to hastly.
I consider a real estate investment bringing 4% net revenu as a backup plan in my home country too.
It is reassuring and let me sleep at peace to keep low return physical asset but keep most of my portfolio in stocks. At the next market crash i should not see -70% on my aggregated portfolio.
Your plan will certainly change when meeting your other half and your family lifestyle may ballooned !
How long will it continue. Are you looking for another employment?
I don’t think you need it while living in Switzerland, but why not. You might check the situation with the disability insurance in your case, though.
Why separate two emergency funds? If this one is in NOK, reconsider.
The way I see your situation:
You have lots of assets for someone of your age, but not enough to live off them. Anyway, they are all rather illiquid.
Your income stream is not secured.
Your emergency fund(s) are okay for emergency, but not enough to support you if you have no other income.
As I said already, in your situation you spend way too much, unless there is some misunderstanding in how you look at your data (e.g. considering 3a contributions as expenses).
Conclusions:
You should drastically reduce your spending.
You should secure your income stream long term. Get a job, study, get certifications if you need to improve your job market position.
With your current spending, you will need an invested portfolio of 2,5-3 millions chf to be sustainable in Switzerland.
It is about what I am targeting with 3,5% safe withdraw rate. Checkout my presentation to retrieve more calculators and simulation.
I would trust the general strength of CHF and focus on it. Can’t see a case for NOK cash. and if you ever move back, you can convert CHF to NOK at max. 1% cost.
On optimizing spending: I have attached a high-level overview of my budget for reference - I would truly appreciate any suggestions. I have not yet started on RAV, maybe my calculations of the insurance is incorrect?
EFT: Thank you for the suggestion! I will continue reading up on which to choose. Would you recommend moving liquidity in NOK to Switzerland for EFT investments as well?
Thank you for your input - you raise a fair point about being able to sleep well at night, knowing that I have a safety net in Norway!
3rd pillar: TrueWealth. Am open for switching this out if recommended.
Family lifestyle: Love kids, but they are not for me. So this is luckily not something that I have to account for - except for spoiling my absolutely fantastic nephews.
Thank you for taking the time to read through and share your thoughts!
I have updated the initial post with what I expect to see (net) in terms of unemployment insurance and added a high-level overview of my expenses. Would love to hear where I can improve!
I am actively applying to available roles and networking to see what I can find “off-market”. The thought of not working is terrifying. I am also learning German. I already hold a M.Sc., but will consider MBA if my efforts are unsuccessful in the next couple of months.
I am definitely not disabled in any way. However, there are some health concerns that are quite expensive to manage in case of flare up.
The emergency fund in NOK is from when I lived there. I have kept it to manage any unforeseen expenses with my property. I am now considering whether it is wiser to exchange a significant part of the NOK to CHF and invested here rather than kept on book in Norway.
I did indeed look at 3a as an expense - I have updated the original post to show my assumption on monthly unemployment insurance and my expenses.
The income you can get through RAV is 70% of 12,350 = 8,645. Minus the mandatory 8% deductions you will get about CHF 7,953 transfered to your account each month.
The first 20 days (1 month) you get nothing (“Wartezeit”). They will also decide how much you are to be blamed for the loss of your job. That might add another penalty of up to 60 days (3 months, “Einstelltage”). Worst case, you get the income only after 4 months.
That´s a brighter picture than the one I drew for myself.
As for the degree to which I am to be blamed for the job loss, my previous employer has confirmed in writing that it is solely driven by external factors. I do understand that this is no guarantee, though. I am mentally prepared that RAV will make their decisions and that I have little influence there.
Here were´s how I got to the net monthly allowance (so actually a bit lower than I stated in the original post). From my understanding, this is still off? If that is the case, where? Sorry for not wrapping my head around this quicker.
RAV
Notes
Insured Salary (Monthly)
11750,00
Average monthly salary over the last 6 or 12 months
Benefit Percentage
0,70
Gross Daily Allowance
379,62
RAV/Unia use 260 workdays per year for calculations.
Gross Monthly Allowance
8237,65
RAV compensates 21.7 workdays per month on average:
Deductions
AHV
436,60
OASI, DI, LEC contributions: 5.3%
ALV
0,00
Unemployment insurance: 0%
BVG Pension Contributions
659,01
8% (continued for accident insurance and RAV benefits, assuming contributions persist).
Is there anything I should keep in mind when transferring NOK to CHF? If you have any pointers or know some forums where I may find additional guidance, I´d appreciate the pointers!
When you say that one can convert CHF to NOK at max. 1% cost, what does that mean? Is this by default or does it require specific actions? Will the cost also apply when converting from NOK to CHF?
Wise is one of the cheapest services to convert currencies and it looks like they offer the same rate as Google (plus they don’t have any spread, as I checked separately). UBS has a spread between buying your NOK (bid 8.038) and selling them to you (ask 8.041). The spread is 0.003 (= 0.04%) and the cost is half of it (with the true price being 8.0395). This is a very decent price for electronic transfers. You can compare that spread with your bank by telling them which amount you want to exchange.
If you are surprised because you have other exchange rate in your head it might be because you are used to changing banknotes. There, the spreads are much larger as it requires manual processes. When making debit card payments with your NOK card in Switzerland, you might have found that they exchanged currencies at very unfavorable rates (and with super large spreads and costs of >1%)
By reading and partipating to this forum, you confirm you have read and agree with the disclaimer presented on http://www.mustachianpost.com/
En lisant et participant à ce forum, tu confirmes avoir lu et être d'accord avec l'avis de dégagement de responsabilité présenté sur http://www.mustachianpost.com/fr/
Durch das Lesen und die Teilnahme an diesem Forum bestätigst du, dass du den auf http://www.mustachianpost.com/de/ dargestellten Haftungsausschluss gelesen hast und damit einverstanden bist.
