Hi everyone.

I came across the following website:

http://www.mata-dienst.ch/indexe.html

Has anybody heard of it, or heard of anyone who has used it, and would you recommend it?

I will be using it to search for accomodation in Zürich.

Thanks.

Haven't used Mata-Dienst, but if you're looking for permanent accomodation, I can recommend Domino. http://www.dominozh.ch/
A bit old school, but the lady is really nice and I think english (so no language barrier). She found us a really nice flat.

Good luck with the search!
/C

I used Mata-Dienst when I came to Zurich in 2006 and they were pretty useless. They gave me less info than I found myself on Homegate and were not good about returning calls.

No I wouldnt.

I saw an ad on homegate that they advertised and called. They told me that I had to personally go down to their office, pay a registration fee before seeing the apartment / giving me more information. Seemed like a cookie cutter response and the person was terribly curt.

Needless to say, I told them where to shove it.

Hi there.. i used them and to be honest its a crappy company...

they asked for my 50 CHF and then they said they will send me apartments to see in the areas i gave them.

they never contact me and after 4 months i found apartment on my own.

so i went and i asked for my money back and they said but this is the service fee.... and i said which service.. i had no reply from you...

they gave me my money with a bad face and i said that they will get all the bad reputation they can have...

so you if you dont want to waste your time and money... dont

We went down there and were told we would have to pay a deposit up front (can't remember how much but it was a few hundred francs) and for that they would search properties for us and let us know if anything came up. The money you paid up front would come off your deposit for the apartment you got and I guess if you found one with someone else you would get it back.

We weren't too sure about it and didn't take it any further - we couldn't find any trustworthy reviews and weren't willing to part with the money upfront.

Yes this was my experience. I paid the money and they gave me a list of 4 places. I asked to see one of them and they said they'd arrange a viewing and contact me. They never got back to me and after a week of calling them myself and getting no concrete info I started searching the web and found comparis.ch and homegate.ch and found a place on my own.

Thanks a lot guys, this was really helpful.

Looks like I've saved myself 50 francs as well as the train ticket to Zürich.

I can't recommend them, the treated me like their victim........
The demanded money for addresses and when you got the flat from one of these addresses you have to pay a "commission" in a range of about half
the rent of your future flat.
(if you are desperate , give them a try but have been warned.......... )

MATA ist definetly a wombat. A few mate`s told me it was useless, i have made the experience it is useless. And probably they live from the registration fee only you give them away in cash.

If you are looking for an place to rent or to put something on the market use homegate.ch (it is a subsidiary company from ZKB)

Yep homegate.ch seems to be the biggest, although we found our place on www.immoscout24.ch.

One time we were viewing a place and another person who was there viewing recommended http://www.immomailing.ch/. Apparently you pay about 40 CHF and you get emailed places that aren't advertised anywhere else.

In the end we didn't use it so I really don't know how if it's any good, but the person who recommended it to us said it was really good.

I do think this is the similar rip off. Never pay in advance for something you might get. In this case it is very unlikely. Who would limit possible tenants for his apartment and takes the risk not to find one?