Quiet boom hits Switzerland

Quiet boom hits Switzerland.
While house prices have exploded in cities like London and Madrid in recent years, a quieter but nonetheless significant boom is occurring in the normally staid property market in Switzerland. Foreign buyers are flooding into places like the town of Kuesnacht, just a few minutes by car from the banking and insurance center of Zurich, driving prices for top-end properties to record levels. 'We are looking at this situation with concern,' said Kuesnacht"s local council president, Max Baumgartner. 'The price of apartments is rising fast. You can"t create more space so it"s getting harder to find affordable places.' Rich Germans, Russians, Britons and Americans have all recently snapped up homes in Kuesnacht, which offers tidy houses and pricey restaurants and a top-band income tax rate of just 10 percent.