Tenants in Germany not only have to pay more for gas and electricity, but also rents are increasing. The increase in a city in Lower Saxony is particularly drastic.
Nationwide, rents without heating have risen by an average of three percent within a year. The average price per square meter advertised in the first half of 2022 was 9.64 euros, according to a response from the federal government to a request from Left MP Caren Lay.
Not only tenants in the metropolises had to pay more for housing - the price increases for first and second rentals were particularly high at 13 percent in Salzgitter in Lower Saxony. In Rostock, net cold rents increased by twelve percent between the first half of 2021 and the first half of 2022. Bottrop was in third place with an increase of ten percent.
Elsewhere, too, rents without heating have increased significantly within a year - for example by nine percent in Kiel, by eight percent each in Leverkusen and Leipzig and by seven percent in Bremen. The values are based on calculations by the Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development (BBSR). The BBSR evaluated advertisements from real estate portals and newspapers.
"The federal government hasn't done anything about the rise in rents," said Lay. "New construction alone is not enough, and that's not making any progress either." The nationwide rent increase is an alarm signal to Chancellor Olaf Scholz to finally stop the rent increase. The left is calling for a nationwide rent cap.
The traffic light government agreed in the coalition agreement to create more affordable housing. Among other things, 400,000 new apartments are to be built per year. However, the German Tenants' Association does not expect the target to be reached. "We are miles away from the federal government's goal of building 400,000 apartments this year," said the President of the German Tenants' Association, Lukas Siebenkotten, to the newspapers of the Funke media group. "On the contrary. I assume that we will build fewer than 300,000 apartments."
