Selling property in Wil: no sale in 2007, its station in Hüntwangen

For Wil there is at least a land model. The cantonal model puts residential building land in Wil at CHF 943 per square metre for 2025.⁷ In 2015 it was still CHF 610, a rise of 54.6 per cent in ten years. Typically the model ranges from CHF 664 to CHF 1,354 per square metre. In 123 of the 160 municipalities in the canton the model value is higher, in 36 lower.

The canton publishes prices paid for residential building land only for its whole territory. Their median for 2021 to 2025 was CHF 1,742.⁷ That median and the model arise in different ways and only serve as rough orientation. The model value for Wil sits well below it.

The model only estimates undeveloped land, not your own plot and not the building on it. For a house in Wil, the building comes on top, with its age, condition and fit-out. With so few local sales, no price next door is a substitute for that derivation.

The cantonal sales statistics only list municipalities with at least one open-market sale of a house, block of flats or condominium in that year.² For 2007, Wil is missing as the only one of the 160 municipalities in the canton. So in that year no house and no flat changed hands on the open market. In 2015 it was 3 houses and no flat.

In 2025, 2 houses and 11 flats changed hands, both still below the threshold of 15.² What happened between the reference years, so few data points do not show.

Only the district of Bülach provides an official figure. In 2025 a flat there cost a median of CHF 1,125,000, from 557 sales, a rise of 42 per cent since 2015.² The figure mixes sales from across the district, from Kloten to Wasterkingen, and is not a price for a flat in Wil. Your own property needs its own derivation from location, plot and building.

The tariff is the same throughout the canton; Wil only levies it.¹ It rises in steps with the gain: 10 per cent on the first CHF 4,000, 40 per cent on the part above CHF 100,000. Ownership then brings a reduction, 20 per cent in the example after 10 full years.

From 20 full years the reduction is highest, 50 per cent. In the example, CHF 61,700 would then be due instead of CHF 98,720.¹ Documented value-enhancing investments reduce the gain further; mere maintenance does not.

Buy a new home to live in afterwards, and the tax can be deferred. You must have lived in the old home yourself and replace it in Switzerland.¹⁰ If the new home costs less than the proceeds, the difference is taxable at once. If it costs no more than the old purchase price and investments, nothing is deferred.¹⁰ And deferred does not mean waived.