Zurich has become one of Europe’s hottest housing markets, with prices surging past London and Paris and showing how local shortages can offset interest rate hikes.
With demand in the Swiss financial hub stoked by hiring from companies including Google, apartments in the central Zurich district are being listed at near record levels of over €18,000 ($19,000) per square meter, more than double London, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Even when widened out to the Zurich canton, which includes some remote mountain villages but also homes for many commuters, asking prices are almost at the level of Paris. Those prices rose 5.8% in August from a year earlier — the biggest increase in 16 months.
