Selling property in Risch: the highest vacancy rate in Zug

Owners in Zurich can look up an official median price for their municipality. In Risch they cannot, as Zug collects none. Portal averages fill the gap poorly, because they lump new and old buildings, small and large plots together.

What is recorded precisely is when Risch’s buildings were built. Risch has 1,197 buildings with residential use, and 34.3 per cent of them were built before 1981. That is the lowest share of the 11 Zug municipalities; the cantonal figure is 48.9 per cent. Oil or gas heats 47.4 per cent of them. No duty to renovate and no price deduction follows from that. Invoices for heating, roof and windows nonetheless belong in your sale documents.

Your own price rests on three things assessed separately: location, plot and building. The house valuation and the flat valuation draw on similar sales nearby, with age and condition. With the free assessment you get a range on paper, justified step by step.

Zug calculates differently from Zurich. Your annual return sets the rate: the gain divided by the investment costs, then by the years of ownership. It applies to the whole gain, within limits of 10 to 60 per cent (§ 199 Zug Tax Act).

Up to the 11th year of ownership, the ceiling is 60 per cent. From the 12th, it loses 2.5 percentage points a year and stands at 25 per cent after 25 years. Risch assesses the tax without applying its 54 per cent multiplier.

If your gain stays below CHF 5,000, Risch charges nothing. Documented value-enhancing investments lower the gain; upkeep does not. Sell the home you live in and buy another in Switzerland, usually within two years before or after, and the tax is deferred. This applies only insofar as you put the proceeds into it. Postponed is not the same as cancelled. At notarisation you lodge a deposit for the estimated tax; the buyer is jointly liable (§ 202 Zug Tax Act).

Selling in Risch involves no property transfer tax. For the change of ownership, the cantonal Land Registry and Geoinformation Office, Aabachstrasse 5 in Zug, bills its time. Every quarter hour begun is billed, with the hour at CHF 180.

The law classes the sale of a property as a transaction of particular importance. The fee is therefore quadrupled for the part up to CHF 6,000; above that, the single rate applies. Each side bears half unless the contract provides otherwise. Towards the office, both are jointly liable.

For the notarisation you go to the Risch notary’s office, where the municipal clerk is responsible. An independent lawyer has no authority to do so for a normal sale of a house or flat. The cantonal fee is CHF 300 to 4,000; notarisations lasting over an hour carry a surcharge. Watch the agent’s commission too: under its leaflet, Risch allows it against the gains tax only up to a cap.