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Corporate housing in Zurich: a guide for companies and HR teams

Housing employees in Zurich for weeks or months: what corporate housing costs, how booking and invoicing work, and what HR teams should look out for.

Modern residential and office buildings at Europaallee in Zurich
Stefan Rohner, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

A new team member starts in six weeks, a project specialist arrives from abroad for four months, an executive commutes weekly until the family relocates – and all of them need somewhere to live in Zurich. For HR teams and assistants, this is a recurring task that consumes a surprising amount of time: hotels are too expensive for long stays, the open housing market is too slow, and booking platforms do not answer questions about consolidated invoices.

This guide summarises what corporate housing in Zurich offers, what it costs, and which questions to clarify before you book.

What is corporate housing?

Corporate housing – also called business apartments or company flats – means fully furnished apartments that companies rent for their employees: ready to move into, with a kitchen, workspace and Wi-Fi, at an all-inclusive monthly rate and with the invoice going directly to the company. The typical duration is between one and twelve months – precisely the gap between a hotel (too expensive) and a standard lease (too rigid, too slow, unfurnished).

Typical use cases:

  • Onboarding and relocation: new employees from abroad need an address from their first working day – the proper flat hunt then happens calmly from the apartment.
  • Project assignments: consultants, engineers or specialists working in Zurich for three to nine months.
  • Weekly commuters: executives who work in Zurich during the week and travel home to their families at weekends.
  • Trainee programmes and visiting researchers: institutions that regularly need to house changing personnel.

Why not simply book a hotel?

For a week: absolutely, take the hotel. From around two to four weeks the maths tips decisively – we have broken this down in detail in our serviced apartment, hotel and Airbnb comparison. The short version from a company’s perspective:

  • Costs: a furnished business apartment usually costs considerably less per month than 30 hotel nights – with more space and a kitchen instead of restaurant expenses.
  • Productivity: an apartment with a workspace and a functioning everyday life sustains people longer than a hotel room; on assignments of several months this shows in satisfaction and retention.
  • Administration: one rental contract, one monthly invoice to the company, one contact person – instead of individual platform bookings on employees’ credit cards.
  • Registration: with a proper rental contract, employees can register with the city – something neither hotels nor most platform bookings allow. For stays over three months and foreign employees with permits, this is essential.

What does corporate housing cost in Zurich?

Prices depend on size, location and duration. As a rough guide: furnished studios and one-bedroom apartments in good, central locations in Zurich typically range from around CHF 2,000 to 4,000 per month – all-inclusive, meaning utilities, Wi-Fi and cleaning as specified in the offer. What matters when comparing options:

  1. Check what all-inclusive means: are electricity, heating, Wi-Fi, bed linen and final cleaning genuinely included? Hidden extras quickly make seemingly cheap offers expensive.
  2. Duration discounts: reputable providers reduce the monthly rate as the stay gets longer. Ask for conditions at three, six and twelve months.
  3. Extension flexibility: projects overrun. Clarify in advance how quickly an extension can be arranged and whether the rate stays stable.

What HR teams should look for

  • Location and commute: short public transport connections to the workplace matter more than prestige addresses. Our apartments on Badenerstrasse, for example, have the tram at the doorstep and are around 15 minutes from the main station – more about the area in our Kreis 4 district portrait.
  • A workspace in the apartment: a proper desk, a decent chair, reliable Wi-Fi – it sounds trivial, but it is what separates a business apartment from a holiday flat.
  • A contact person instead of a hotline: when something goes wrong, your employees need a direct contact with a short response time – ask specifically how support is organised.
  • Invoicing: invoices to the company, on request consolidated across several apartments and months – this saves your accounting team a lot of fiddly work.
  • A framework for recurring needs: if you regularly house people, a standing arrangement with a provider who reserves availability ahead of time pays off.

How booking typically works

  1. Enquiry with key details: dates, number of people, budget range and preferred location are enough for a first selection.
  2. Concrete options: instead of anonymous search results, you receive genuinely available apartments with prices – from us within eight hours.
  3. Contract and invoice to the company: the rental contract is issued to the company or the employee, the invoice goes directly to the company.
  4. Move-in without lead time: furnished and ready – keys handed over in person or via straightforward self-check-in.

Conclusion

Corporate housing closes the gap between hotels and the housing market – and takes exactly the work off HR teams that costs the most time in relocations and project assignments. If you clarify the three core questions in advance (all-inclusive? extensions? invoice to the company?), you book predictably and without surprises.

Need to house employees in Zurich right now? You will find suitable offers on our business apartments in Zurich page – or simply send us your key details and we will reply within eight hours. For relocation cases involving families, our relocation guide is also worth a look.