Hi everyone,
Quick a few questions please.

1. I have an unfurnished flat, now moving away in April and have bought a lot of good quality furnishings as did not expect to leave so soon. I want to know if you can offer up your furnishings as a single 'lot' to a new tenant to take over your things? Or - should I just sell them off?

2. Do people coming in want to take over a furnished flat (as an unfurnished lease) for ease of getting on with settling in as a Swiss newbie?

Thanks for the help.
David.

I believe the crucial question here is, are you the tenant or the landlord of this apartment?

There is nothing stopping you as a private individual, offering or selling anything to anyone.

As long as you do not make that a condition to get the rental contract

Same rules apple for a business/landlord in this.

I am the tenant with a two year lease which I can break due to need to return to the UK expectedly. Landlord very supportive, but the bottom line is that it is an unfurnished flat as the bottom line.

Thank you.
No, I was going to propose it from the outset to any potential tenants taking over my apartment.

I would however already start selling things, you'll never get as much for the whole batch at once as when selling in parts. Also it is your problem if the landlord takes in a new renter who does not take over your goods.

Perhaps you can talk with the landlord that he takes all over and if it is enough he can rent out furnished

Hi!

You can. But potential tenants have no obligation at all to take over any of your items.

However...

Sometimes, yes. I personally did, with a separate handwritten contract for the furniture. I think it saves time and money for both parties, unless the furniture is really ugly/dirty/etc or the new tenant has a lot of premium furniture from previous apartment.

Sometimes there are more candidates and at least a few of them are willing to take over everything, hoping to get some priority when the current tenant forwards the applications to the landlord. Without any guarantee, of course - in the end the landlord does not care about your furniture, nor does the contract.

In the end, I think you should definitely offer your things together with the apartment, it's a very good moment for doing business.

Thank you - I will ask her if she is prepared to take them on. Possibly against the next month's rent...her is hoping. Appreciated!

Well, I was just well and truly chastised for this because I did not follow the marketplace rules on this site, but I HIGHLY RECOMMEND Facebook Marketplace. I made 5175 franc in 4 days. 'Nuff said, ahem.

True, but you save SO much time...

That also happened to me, although it was in Italy. I rented a flat as furnished, but the living room was just having an old sofa and a tiny table. I repainted it and furnished completely piece after piece over 4 years, and when I left it was the landlord who asked me to buy everything as it was. We agree on one monthly rent, which was a little more than 50% of the original price of the furniture.

I really don't know how and where would I have placed all these things, given that I was moving to Zurich by train... but that's another story

Ok - thank you very much.
Just so annoyed to have bought for the long-term - but then things change...
I am sure there will be new arrivals who want to move straight in somewhere and get on with life!

Lessons learned.
Was complete newbie to Geneva and immediately up and running with a crazy-busy job so wanted the easiest route to setting up - and should have found this forum earlier!

It sounds like your landlord has been understanding, but if they change their mind, I think you could consider subletting it as a furnished flat.

But he already cancelled, so subletting or not, landlord could demand an empty apartment in April (Or whatever month they agreed on, and I assume things are on paper)

Not a condition. But when we were looking for someone to take over our flat, to the landlord we naturally only passed on the name of the candidate that was willing to take the all of furniture that we didn't want to bring to our new home.
All of the other candidates didn't have a chance. A win-win situation all round as the new tenant this way didn't have to buy so much furniture, we got rid of our furniture and got out of our contract early.

Yeah, taking on the furniture is often more or less a bribe to get the apartment. Common practice in many areas.

I wouldn't go as far as saying it is a bribe. I had various people interested (including being interested in the furniture) but some said point blank that they were not interested in buying it. Those that weren't, unfortunately for them, simply were not of interest to us and as such most did not even get to see the flat. Things have to work for all sides involved in these things.

shame on you.

Not at all. The new tenant was moving from a small 1 room flat to a 3.5 room flat and didn't have hardly anything, so he was pleased to be able to have half the stuff he needed without having to go out and buy new.
It's quite common to offer stuff to prospective tenants.
Why throw good stuff away when it can still be sold to and used by others?

you could have sold it separately and not make it a combi-deal. what you did, was misusing your position as you didn't pass the other candidates to the land lord.