I have sold my company last year in Germany and the window opened to move to Switzerland.  
Now as a German speaker it would make sense to move to the German speaking part of the country, but I moved to Lugano (Italian-speaking).

There are multiple reasons for it:  
\- I like the blend of Swiss Structure and Italian Dolce Vita  
\- The weather is very nice  
\- I didnt want to live in a 100k+ city, coming from Stuttgart  
\- I wanted to live close to the lake

The things that instantly stood out: Everything seems to work here. The fountain system works, the trains are on time, there is no garbage on the street and there are no homeless people. Yes, this might be not the case for every part in Switzerland but it is the case here.

The city is very walkable so I go by foot or bike everywhere, I choose the train for long distance, so far it has been working great.

I have remote income, but I have heard that its pretty hard to find a job in Lugano.

I live in a Short Term rental apartment, which is perfect for me, because I dont have any furniture and it has everything. Think of it like a hotel room with everything you need.

Basically every German tells you that Switzerland is sooo expensive. I have tracked everything, not to prove them wrong, but to see if its actually true and here are my real numbers from the last 3 months:

Privat Liability Insurance: 9 CHF  
Phone: 25 CHF  
Serafe: 28 CHF  
Halbtax: 16 CHF + Transport (Cable Car, etc) 80 CHF = 96 CHF  
Groceries: 350 CHF  
Health Insurance: 446 CHF  
Rent: 1'320 CHF  
Parking Spot: 200 CHF

This brings the total to 2'474 CHF, which is not a lot for my case. I was paying the same in Stuttgart, Germany. I think this stereo type is from the people who visit Switzerland as tourists, and then of course its not that cheap.

Some observations from the city: Its very positive to see, that the city is actively trying to make the it more liveable, I am talking about adding spots to Swim. To give you an anecdote: Stuttgart, where I come from also has a big lake, but you are not allowed to swim there (dont ask me why). This is not the case here, the quality of life is very high.

Even tough quite a lot of tourists visit the city there is no real visible trash or grafitti in the city, this is totally not the case in Germany. Everywhere you go, you see trash on the street and Grafitti everywhere even regular homes. The trash system here makes so much more sense than the one in Germany.

Some thing that I dont quite understand, you see a lot of young people especially woman on the streets, a lot more than older folks. Its strange, because Lugano is quite an old city when it comes to population.

People told me that Lugano is so boring, but I cant confirm. I am actually glad there is no party culture here, because that often leads to problems. You are in the mountains in 15min, you have regular events in the city that is enough for me.

In general I am really happy to be here and I try my best to integrate into the local culture.

I have also started a [Youtube channel](https://www.youtube.com/@MarvinBlach), where I share my progress.

If you have any questions feel free to ask me.

I am now living in Lugano, Switzerland for almost 3 months, here are my honest thoughts