I am new to CH as of nov 20 and am currently renting a short-stay (furnshed) apartment while looking for permanent housing (in Zürich).

Since my arrival, I have been to about 7 or 8 viewings, and I like to think I'm getting more comfortable with them. I am shocked actually, about the large number of people coming to each viewing. I guess that in the Netherlands, where I come from, it requires less (paper)work to buy a house or to get a job, than it does in Zürich to get an apartment.

Anyway, my question is: why are tenants actively involved in looking for a new tenant? In NL, if I rent an apartment I have a 1 month notice period. I hand in the notice, and at the end of the notice period I leave the apartment. After I leave, the landlord will usually inspect if I haven't damaged anything and if not, he will put the apartment up for rent again.

To me, it seems stange that all these people I have been to willingfully let like 30 to 50 people dance around in their apartment. What am I missing here?

Many leases have at least a 3-month notice period. In some cantons or cities, you also can only move in certain months. I think in Zurich it's March, June and September, but I could be wrong. Someone from the area will chime in soon.

If a renter wants to get out of the contract early, or outside of the specific moving dates, then he or she has to actively help find a new tenant. In the German-speaking part this is called a Nachmieter.

As for 30-50 people dancing around your apartment, housing is pretty tight here. It's not uncommon to have a few dozen applicants for every flat. I suppose the question is, do you want to hold an open house on your own and see who is dancing around your flat? Or do you want the landlord to do it and not know who's dancing. In some cases, the landlord will charge you for advertising the flat.

Edit - Medea explains it far better than I can so pay attention to her post.

It's called supply and demand. Landlords/agencies here prefer not to have a gap between one tenant moving out and another moving in. So it's not at all strange that the current tenants are there when you're viewing a property.

Also remember that usually notice here is 3 months and can be 6 months depending on what your canton's "official moving dates" are. Yes, the Swiss have official moving dates, usually 31st March, 30th June and 30th September. Some cantons use all 3, others only 2 like Fribourg. When we were renting our contract had 6 month's notice period and the two dates were 31st March and 30th September.

That doesn't mean you can't move outside those dates, but contracts will be geared around them more often than not. But sometimes tenants want to terminate early for numerous reasons so you'll see properties outside those dates being advertised. In this case, it's the tenant's responsibility to find a someone to replace them under the same rental terms. If they can find someone to take over their lease then they can leave before their next official moving date. If they can't and still decide to move out early, they're responsible for paying the outstanding months' rental money.

My flat in ZH only had 2 dates a year end of March & end of September when you could cancel after giving 3 months notice. I did & only ever let one person view when the landlord wanted to look at the condition of the flat. I had rented it for 15 years.

Everyone thanks for replying. This explains a lot. And also gears my attention towards the notice period that will be in my contract (if I can ever find an apartment, that is )

What I heard is that if the tenant is responsible for finding a new tenant, then the landlord should offer the apartment to the new tenant with the same contract as the current. But if the landlord wants to change the contract, e.g. by raising the rent, then the tenant is off the hook and the landlord should find the new tenant by themselves.