Where to retire in Switzerland?

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Folks that are planning to retire early in Switzerland: have you thought about which region/canton would suit you best? It’d be interesting to compare notes about either specific areas/cantons or (especially) criteria that would be important to you.

Here’s a preliminary list of mine:

  • noise/traffic levels, closeness to nature
  • access to day to day shopping/services/health care
  • distance to schooling/university (for the kids)
  • tax rates
  • real estate prices

PS: been lurking for a while but this is my first post. Hi everybody! :slight_smile:

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I’ll add public transport links to the list, longer term (e.g. 70yr old +) proximity and easy access to shops, community and social activities.

Although the ebike tech in 40yrs will mean we can be picked up and transported completely autonomously - a few extra kms won’t matter

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One point I would add is the closeness to family and friends. Not too close, not too far away?

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Personally, I really don’t think I am going to move when I retire. I really like where I live now and all my family and Friends are close by. I may choose a different county for a better tax rate. But I probably won’t go overboard.

If I didn’t know anybody in Switzerland, I would decide based on:

  1. Small village in nature
  2. Good tax rate
  3. Price of a house
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Tax-wise I would retire in countryside in Kanton Zug or north-part of Kanton Schwyz. In the countryside, far from cities, apartment prices are less ridiculous.

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Il Ticino

At retirement income, taxes are so low that they barely matter (even more if married).

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i havnt spent time thinking on this topic so far. my current bet is that i like the zurich theatre so much that i wont move away. maybe out of city zurich, but definately not far away.

taxes are not smallest, but all the infrastructure, the cultural offerings and the central position of zurich main station to reach out to anywhere in switzerland are a good deal for me. on top of that, i am fond of my social network here.

But, all this might be subject to change, so i will probably at a later point make up my mind. with my net worth approaching 9% FIRE, i still have some time^^

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Upvote for Ticino and hopefully somewhere where I can easily reach a train station. A Train from Ticino can lead you easily to Zurich but also to Milan.

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There’s even a new direct train from many parts of Ticino to Malpensa airport now (although flying isn’t a very mustachian thing).

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I wouldn’t trust that due to frequency, changes, delays etc…

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hourly

You clearly didn’t read my post

Hard to tell since it’s new, but you’re unlikely to be more than an hour late.

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Maybe… which post are you referring to ? These 3 lines ?

There’s even a new direct train from many parts of Ticino to Malpensa airport now (although flying isn’t a very mustachian thing).

I’ve read horror stories about these first months of service, thus I won’t risk to loose i.e. an intercontinental flight just to to bet on it…

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Let’s say you have 2 Mio once you fire. With a dividend yield of 2% you will still have 40k of income per year to tax. In some places you will have to pay almost no income tax, other places that are not that friendly for low income brackets you will still have to pay a significant amount of taxes. But what is even more important is that you will have to pay wealth tax on 2 Mio which in some places can be really heavy (14k+ per year on top of income tax). The low wealth tax places are not necessary the same as the low income tax places. Also something to consider is that some cantons give out health insurance premium reductions based on income alone without taking wealth into consideration…

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Hello, did you get any interesting response to your question? which area is the best to retire early in Switzerland?
thanks for sharing