41 % of the properties in Zurich are owned by big housing companies. Which explains why the prices skyrocket. They have the cash to renovate or pull places down and built super expensive apartments. Capitalism at its greediest.
The thing is: if those pension-funds donât generate returns, people will get angry, too.
Same for 3a funds.
And pension funds canât invest in three-times leveraged S&P 500 
They can either buy (Swiss) government bonds, triple A company bonds - or real estate.
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No, Australia just sucks at transport infrastructure.
FTFY
Itâs OK, we can give them a 14th month pension too.
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I lived in a pension found owned apartment. I wondered if with the pension found costs I would be better off renting and saving in a 2nd/3rd pillar or not renting and not saving in these founds 
Do you think these powerful landlords lobbied for the Bundesgesetz Ăźber die Raumplanung from 2014 which was voted for mainly by the big city dwellers because they were convinced it will only impact the rural bĂźnzlis living in their detached houses? It canât really get better for the landlords than that - constrict construction land supply and profit. Who would think political left agenda would be so favorable to the richest.
Well, one could say, letâs enact price cap and squeeze these landlords. Why not, then youâll get even more interesting things out of that - whole shady dealings who the flat gets, and clientelist voters often damaging the economy by voting for those offering more privileges, paid of course by someone eventually.
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I like how the only investment options are now either super safe liability-driven purchases of sovereign debt and real estate, or triple-levered equity fundsâŚ
How about the pension funds provide capital for the LONG TERM (aka 15-20-50 years), and take some (not full) risk so they can actually generate returns that could potentially match or beat inflation? Because sitting on negative rate bonds and hoarding apartment while collecting RENT from society is not necessarily helping society nor their investors (society again).
Of course the biggest problem underlying everything today is the fact that assets appreciate at a rate multiple of real incomeâs respective growth rate, meaning everyone but asset owners get left further and further behind, and then they get accused âtheyâre not working/saving hard enoughâ while everything gets more expensive and increasingly unaffordable.
And the Migros pension fund guy can f* right off. Itâs not a right to live in Zurich he says⌠OK, is there a right to live anywhere? Is it the right of investors to always make money?
Well, in some places they talk about allowing more investments in speculative assets such as crypto. I guess it is time for them to find a patsy.
thanks Iâd prefer them to burn the money at steady but low ~-1 to -2%, what a miserable situation
If you put a price cap on rents, then only some lucky ones will profit.
You have a city size X, thatâs how much population fits there, wether everyone has or hasnât God given right to live there. The only reasonable solution is to have more land for dens(er) development which for some reason isnât happening. This is not a fault of greedy capitalists but of politicians.
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IMO this is the worst solution, which is happening all over Switzerland since a few years. I would much more like living in a 50 floor tower in a city with lots of parks and green spaces, rather than in a 3 floor building with no views except a concrete structures, having nowhere to go around, only shops and streets. Dense development is evil. Visit a Spanish city if you donât believe me.
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Iâd like too. But, beyond 8-10 floors the engineering challenges become harder. Elevators become the only practical way to go up or down, so more of them are needed when compared to shorter building where are only used by people with limited mobility. Delivering water at the right pressure at level 40 is another challenge. The extra material to make the tower resistant to wind and earthquakes occupies valuable floor area in lower levels. Heating and cooling are more expensive than shorter buildings. The overall outcome is higher price per sqm of floor area.
50-floor buildings are like sport cars. Great cars, but they come with higher capex and opex, thus not a mass produced solution. Only a few ones.
but isnât it only temporary? I get you, 1 50 floors tower == 10 smaller buildings, however with time the prices are going up anyway 
I donât get the part about heating/cooling costs, but nvm
EDIT: actually, even if youâre right that the costs explosion with 50 floors tall buildings, we could still have 10 floor buildings instead of 3 floors⌠but thatâs Switzerland where investors are happy if they can squeeze 1 floor taller building in place of an old one to demolish
If a small apartment in 2050 will be as expensive as a nice apartment today, that doesnât make the nice apartment today affordable.
Heating and cooling costs are higher because most tall buildings have glass facades. If I remember well, the tallest building in Zurich around HardbrĂźcke is a glass greenhouse. Tall buildings without glass facades are more energy efficient, but theyâre oddities that are scarce around the world:
it seems more of a fashion than anything else, no?
The fire regulations for buildings above 25m become strict and expenisve, as they are classified âtall buildingsâ. Sprinklers, fire brigade lift, positive ventilation in fire escapes during alarm, and so on are all a must. Also costs a lot.
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Perhaps we should go underground?
That creates different issues - ground water mostly, but also ventilation and of course waste water disposalâŚ
But yes, high buildings donât come cheap.
"Weâre gonna build a whole new world for ourselves
Look, they clap eyes on us and weâre dead, right?
So weâre gonna make a new life where theyâll never find us
You know where? Underground
You should see it down there
Hundreds of miles of drains
Sweet and clean now after the rain
Dark, quiet, safe
We can build houses and everything
Start again from scratch
And whatâs so bad about living underground, eh?
Itâs not been so great living up here if you want my opinion"