H everyone,

Luckily, we received 3 offers from flats we saw last week. We replied to them saying that we would be happy to see the details and received contracts, and turned down 2 of them the next day, once we heard from our top choice. We signed that contract and moved into our property now.

The other 2 landlords (one agency, one private) asked us to pay 100/150 CHF for not signing the contract. I saw a few threads here regarding this situation, and also spoke to the tenants association on phone, and replied to them that we will not be paying this fee as we think there is no legal background for this fee (as also stated on : https://www.mieterverband.ch/mv/miet...haedigung.html).

The private landlord sent us a signed letter today saying that because we said "happy to hear" and gave him an address to send the contract, he assumed acceptance of the offer. Therefore, he is insisting us to pay 100 CHF within 10 days, otherwise he will involve debt register and will call the court.

To me paying a fee for not signing a contact (that we never saw before) is a bit of nonsense. But we are new to Switzerland and don't want to get into trouble from our first month. When we spoke with tenants association on the phone, they told us that if the agency/landlord is really mean, they can put us on the debt register. Does anybody have any experience on how to handle this situation?