Thun Real Estate Market: Housing Shortage, Bostudenzelg and Growth

Growth & extreme housing shortage

As of December 31, 2025, the city of Thun had 44,663 residents, 17.2 percent of whom held foreign nationality. The cantonal structure plan anticipates growth of around 12 percent within 15 years – equivalent to roughly 5,000 additional people, or just under one new resident per day. The areas considered focus zones for this growth are primarily Thun railway station and Thun Nord.

In terms of rent levels, Thun sits noticeably below Bern, roughly on par with the municipality of Köniz: the median monthly rent in the city of Thun is CHF 2,374, which works out to an average of CHF 23.75 per square metre per month. Broken down by postcode, tenants in the 3600 Thun postal area pay an average of CHF 2,633 per month, while those in 3604 Thun pay CHF 2,287 per month.

The key figure: In 2024, the vacancy rate in the city of Thun was just 0.18 percent. By comparison, the Swiss average stands at 1.08 percent, and a balanced market is generally assumed only from around 1.3 percent upward. Thun is therefore experiencing one of the most pronounced housing shortages in Switzerland.

Bostudenzelg – 600 new apartments

One of the city's responses to this scarcity is Bostudenzelg, a major development in the Neufeld district: around 600 new apartments are planned on roughly 45,000 square metres of land. The land is owned in equal halves by the city of Thun and by the Bernische Pensionskasse BPK together with Frutiger AG; around half of the planned apartments are intended to be rented out on a non-profit or affordable basis.

The public vote on the development plan was clearly approved on November 30, 2025, with 62.8 percent in favour. However, because a referendum was filed against the project, the start of construction on the first private building phase is now expected to be delayed until at least the end of 2026.

City plans to invest 50 million in property purchases

Given the tight situation, the Thun city council is also planning a framework credit of CHF 50 million for strategic property purchases. The goal is to secure key developed and undeveloped plots of land at an early stage – a direct response to the ongoing housing shortage and a desire to gain greater control over future development.

Thun also has a number of structural characteristics worth noting: the Thun military training area is, at 6.5 square kilometres, the largest and, founded in 1819, the oldest military training area in Switzerland, and accounts for around 3,000 direct and indirect jobs. The wider Thun economic region, comprising 12 municipalities, has 109,012 residents and 54,880 employees. Tourism on Lake Thun also plays a role in the local economy, with 499,244 overnight stays recorded in the region.

What this means for property owners

A vacancy rate of 0.18 percent means, in practice, that anyone offering a rental apartment in Thun will typically find demand within a very short time. At the same time, projects such as Bostudenzelg and the city's planned CHF 50 million framework credit are increasing the pressure to act – new large-scale developments change neighbourhoods and create additional management requirements, while the delay caused by the referendum shows how politically contested individual construction projects can remain. A nationwide home-ownership rate of around 36 percent also suggests that the rental segment traditionally plays an important role in cities like Thun; exactly how the rental and condominium-ownership shares break down within Thun itself is not reported separately in the statistics. In this environment, it is especially worthwhile for property owners to organise letting and management professionally and efficiently – for example with flat-rate property management in Thun.

All figures and legal references in this article are disclosed and linked → Sources.