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Every year, various (replacement) new-build projects are rented out by the housing cooperatives in the Canton of Zürich. Most months there are about 1–2 such lettings with a few dozen apartments. This February, however, we experienced a truly exceptional situation: In total, you could apply for over 400 apartments, some in very popular locations! In this blog post, we look back on the most intense new-build-project month since our founding in summer 2023. Of course, our subscribers received an email in every case as soon as the rental went live.
These 7 projects were rented out in February 2025
Let’s start with a list. Below, we show chronologically which housing cooperatives rented out apartments in new-build projects in February 2025. We also briefly state whether the rental launch was known in advance and roughly how long you could apply.
February 7: Ersatzneubau Schönauring der Baugenossenschaft Schönau in 8052 Zürich Seebach. 89 apartments. The letting was originally planned for September 2024; due to delays there were only vague updates on the cooperative’s website. The apartments then went online on February 7 without warning. The application window was open for 1 week.
February 7: Siedlung Lanzrain der Baugenossenschaft Schönheim in 8102 Oberengstringen. 47 apartments. The rental launch was known in advance. The letting started at 17:00 and the server was overloaded for the first 15 minutes; after that, things moved very quickly, and the apartments were offline again the same evening.
February 7: Siedlung Bramen der Baugenossenschaft Schönheim in 8302 Kloten. Over 100 apartments. The rental launch was known in advance. The letting started at 17:00 and the server was overloaded for the first 15 minutes. After that it moved along relatively quickly, but some apartments remained online until February 9.
February 11: Projekt Langgrütweg der GEWOBAG in 8047 Zürich Albisrieden. 24 apartments. The rental launch was not known. On February 11 we discovered the rental portal on the cooperative’s website. You could apply until February 13.
February 11: Siedlung Im Weierächer der GEWOBAG in 8907 Wettswil am Albis. 58 apartments. The rental launch was not known. On February 11 we discovered the rental portal on the cooperative’s website. Applications still open.
February 12: Projekt Lerchenhalde60Plus der Baugenossenschaft Hagenbrünneli in 8046 Zürich Affoltern. About 40 apartments for people in their later years. The rental launch was known in advance. The letting started at 10:00 in the morning. There was no rush for the apartments, and you could apply for about 2 weeks.
February 25: Siedlung Station W der IGEBA-Baugenossenschaft in 8620 Wetzikon. 70 apartments. The rental launch was not known. Applications still open.
What we learned
This month brought us some insights that we’d like to share with you here:
1. Good preparation is essential. Sometimes the letting only lasts a few hours (see Lanzrain). Accordingly, it’s important to always have documents such as a debt enforcement register extract, your pay slips, references, and a cover letter (which can be quickly adapted) ready (see also: Checklist). If the rental launch is known in advance, it’s important to be online at the announced time. Just a few hours later it may already be too late.
2. It’s not predictable how long the application window will be. And what’s stated on the cooperative’s website doesn’t always hold true. Often it’s much shorter than announced. Nor can demand necessarily be inferred from the location of the apartments. The very centrally located project on Langgrütweg was online for about 2 days. The Lanzrain project in Oberengstringen, i.e., outside the city of Zürich, was offline again after about 3 hours. We would have expected the opposite scenario. Perhaps it was also because the rental launch in Oberengstringen had been known for a long time and therefore many more people were in the starting blocks at the right time. At Langgrütweg, by contrast, the application window came out of the blue. Here, people with our search subscription had a particularly big advantage.
3. Without insider knowledge it’s difficult. Some of these projects are let via portals that aren’t even linked on the cooperatives’ websites or aren’t easy to find there. If you don’t search all new-build projects daily, you’ll very quickly miss a rental launch. If you’d like to search manually, you can use our list, which we update regularly. Or you can subscribe to our search subscription. Where possible, we send an alert about 7–10 days before the rental launch. Unfortunately, this isn’t always feasible, as the date often remains a mystery until the end. In any case, our subscribers always receive an email as soon as the application window is open.
More tips and tricks on first lettings at cooperatives can also be found in this blog post of ours.
We monitor every new build by the cooperatives in Zürich
February was a hectic month for us. We do everything manually for the new-build projects. If the rental launch is unknown, we search daily for information on the relevant projects. Only in this way can we guarantee that our subscribers are the first to hear about them. When a rental portal goes online, we’re always a bit nervous when sending the emails, because we don’t want to deliver misinformation. We very much hope that you were able to apply for many of these great new builds and that in a few months we’ll receive lots of happy subscription cancellations from you. By the way: it’s not over yet! This year, several more exciting cooperative new-build projects will be let, including the project of the ABZ in the Leimbach quarter, the Herzogenmühle project of the Milchbuck Baugenossenschaft, the Holberg 2 development in Kloten.
Vermietung 2025
GEWOBAG
Baugenossenschaft Hagenbrünneli
Baugenossenschaft Schönau
IGEBA Baugenossenschaft