We left the U.S. for Switzerland and our apartment costs $2,883/month

By the time Mary Brown she met her husband Sébastien, they both lived in Chicago. But on their second date, Sébastien, a native of France, told Braun that he didn’t plan to stay in the United States much longer — he had been in America for 15 years and wanted to return to Europe soon.

“He actually almost came back, but then he decided to stay a little longer and he met me, so he was very serendipitous in that way,” Braun tells CNBC Make It.

In late 2020, the couple moved into a two-bedroom apartment together in North Chicago. At that time, Sébastien worked as the head of the business unit for ZF Group, a German technology manufacturing company, while Maria worked as a social media manager for a hair company.

They both worked remotely and eventually the apartment proved too small for them, so the couple moved across the street to a 3-bedroom, 2-bathroom duplex where they pay $2,585 a month in rent.

“I miss it so much. It was a really nice building that still had brick walls and Chicago character, but it’s been gutted and renovated,” Braun says.

Braun and Sébastien lived in the apartment for about a year and went through the covid-19 pandemic together. During that time, they began to seriously consider a move to Europe and which country they would soon call home. Switzerland was at the top of his list.

Sébastien was enrolled in an executive MBA program at the International Institute for Management Development in Lausanne, Switzerland. “He chose it because he was able to do a lot remotely from the United States,” says Braun. “Since the long-term goal was to get back to Europe, it made sense for him to do a European program.”

Another mitigating factor for the couple was that Sébastien had not been able to see his family in France for an entire year due to pandemic travel restrictions. He started working actively to be transferred to the European offices of his company.

The ZF Group offered Sébastien a transfer to an office in Germany, but Braun rejected the idea. He didn’t speak the language and there were no direct flights to and from Chicago. After Sébastien was offered a transfer to Belgium, but it fell through. He was given another opportunity to work out of a new office in Bern, Switzerland, the country’s capital.

Although a move to Bern didn’t always appeal to Braun – it still doesn’t have direct flights to and from Chicago – he realized that Zurich was close enough that Sébastien could walk into the office every day.

“I really thought it was the best career opportunity for him, and at the time, the company I worked for was willing to let me go and work remotely for them from Switzerland,” says Braun. “The stars have aligned.”

In December 2021, the couple had started the process of moving to Switzerland – which included obtaining Swiss visas – so, they didn’t actually end up moving until September 2022. Braun and Sébastien got married in March of that year, ship most of their stuff. in Switzerland, and moved in with Braun’s parents while they waited for the papers to clear.

“We still had a lot of time to adjust to it and be with my family,” says Braun. “Which I think helped make the transition easier.”

When Braun and Sébastien finally moved to Zurich, they lived in temporary accommodation – first in a furnished 1-bedroom, 1-bath room that they paid 3,880 francs or $4,253 USD and then a 2-bedroom, 1.5-bathroom that they rented for 5,090 francs . or $5,580, according to documents reviewed by CNBC Make It.

“I remember sitting on the bed in the temporary housing with our dog and thinking how is this real? How are we in Switzerland? How did our dog make it here? How did everything fall into place?” he says Brown.

“This was our real life now and we had to deal with it. It was just surreal.”

That December, the couple found a more permanent living arrangement. It was a 2-bedroom, 1.5-bathroom apartment in the Enge district of Zurich where the rent was 4,120 francs or $4,516.

The couple loved that apartment, but in January 2023, Braun learned that she was pregnant. Living on the fourth floor of a building without an elevator has become a major concern. The couple was also notified that their rent would be increased. They thought it was the right time to find a place with more space.

Five months later, Braun and Sébastien left the old apartment and moved into a 3-bedroom, 2-bathroom apartment in Uitikon, a town just outside Zurich, for 3,950 francs or $4,330 a month. Braun says one of the benefits for them was that their taxes went down because they no longer lived in the city.

In Switzerland, people pay federal income tax rates ranging from 0 to 11.5%, but this does not include local taxes, according to H&R Block. Counties, which are similar to states in the United States, and municipalities also pay taxes.

A drawback? It wasn’t so easy to get around in his new city without a car. When Braun gave birth to the couple’s daughter and went on maternity leave, she was employed as a social media manager for a Swiss company that was not friendly towards remote work. “I started to worry about just balancing life,” she says.

There was a possibility that Braun would lose his job if he did not return to his office full time when his leave was up.

“If I was in the United States, I would have my mother or someone I know well to watch our daughter. We started to think that we need to have a plan for the worst financial scenario.”

When Braun’s boss confirmed the worst, Sébastien left to find better paying work while she considered her options. “I appreciate that [my boss] he was very honest with me, but it was unfortunate because I had to choose between my career or my family,” he says.

“I took the loss, but there are other bonuses to being home with our daughter. Being a stay-at-home mom is just a different job.”

Last year, the couple and their daughter moved to a town outside Friborg, just under two hours from downtown Zurich, where the family still resides. They pay 2,630 francs, or $2,883, per month for their 3-bedroom, 2-bathroom apartment.

“We were able to save a big chunk of change and Sébastien earned more money. It didn’t really close the gap between me losing my income, but it definitely helped from a financial point of view,” says Braun.

Also, as French is a primary language in that area, Braun was excited to raise her daughter there, knowing that she would learn the language and improve her own.

Since becoming a stay-at-home mom, Braun says she really appreciates the sense of security that comes with living in Switzerland. She takes a lot of nature walks alone with her daughter and the family dog.

“The level of security is so different here that honestly, as a woman, I just feel safer doing things that I would probably think twice about doing in the United States,” says Mary. “It feels very safe and secure while still being beautiful at the same time.”

Braun and Sébastien have been living in Switzerland for more than two years, and although they miss America’s sense of celebration and having so much available like Amazon delivery and stores that stay open after 6 p.m., the results of the presidential election of 2024 mean. that, for them, going back is off the table: “There is too much uncertainty in the United States”

“I never want our daughter to feel like she’s not American and I want her to culturally identify with the United States, at least the good part of it,” Braun says. “It’s also tempting because for me, it would be easy to get back into the job market with my history of journalism, especially as a freelancer, which is not really a thing in Switzerland.

But, “I think socially it doesn’t really make sense for us at the moment,” he adds.

The couple thinks they will move again to be closer to Sébastien’s family, but that won’t happen anytime soon. “Having the ability to get help and have someone to confide in and watch our daughter is amazing,” Braun says. “I think her growing up in one of their cultures would be really cool for us.”

Until then, Braun is focused on learning French to expand her career opportunities if and when they move to Sébastien’s home country and is ready to return to work.

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