The stress and the difficulty of finding a house, and of registering Dante at a nursery, increased my state of nervousness. The company where my husband works, ‘Cleancorp’, had arranged for us to stay in the rental apartment for only a few months, after which we would have to vacate it for other families arriving in Geneva. Cleancorp were generously paying the rent for our apartment for that short period. My husband and I had no idea of the cost of renting apartments in Geneva.

At the estate agent’s we discovered that we were living in one of the most exclusive parts of the city. To think it had seemed to be an ordinary apartment block. The rent for our apartment was CHF 10,000 per month! That was well out of our budget, without a shadow of a doubt. A typical mortgage to buy a house would certainly cost less; it was better to invest in Swiss bricks and mortar.

A Geneva villa

Getting to view the houses was a battle, a dogfight. As soon as the adverts were published in the newspaper, I quickly made appointments with the agencies, who I attempted to move to pity with the story of our difficulties and the urgent need we had to buy a house. They never did take pity and what’s more they would never call us back if I didn’t chase them down. A nightmare! I would arrive at a villa and there would already be a queue of people interested in buying it, lots of them colleagues of Harold. Often on a Monday, I would make an arrangement to see a villa three days later, only to be told on Tuesday that the house was already sold.

Among the few buildings that we managed to see was a small but beautiful villa a few kilometres from Geneva. I immediately fell in love with that villa. We were among many people visiting the villa at the same time and I tried to suck up to the lady from the agency. Harold was enthusiastic, so we informed her that we were seriously interested.

The imperturbable estate agent told us:
‘You are not the only ones; there are a lot of families interested in buying this villa. Fill in the standard form to make an offer, and then the owner will make the decision.’

Perfect, I thought. We would fill in the form and offer the exact amount asked for in the advert. We were convinced that since we hadn’t tried to lower the price by even 50 Swiss Francs, the house would be sold to us. That week was long. We fantasised about our imminent move into the beautiful villa.

Read how Flo’s house search turns out, and many more stories of life as an expat in Switzerland, in Welcome to Switzerland! Paradise (Apparently), by Flo Regina, available in bookshops and online.

Whether you’re new in town, have lived here for years or are simply curious to discover more about this country with its remarkable people and customs, you'll find yourself chuckling at this southern Italian woman’s attempts to adapt to life in Switzerland.

Photo credits: Geneva apartments by dearanxiety (Flickr.com); Geneva villa by tillwe (Flickr.com)