7 ms·

This is a catastrophe and very disappointing. Here is a little personal anecdote: I used to live in the center of Berlin Mitte when I was a student, had rented

This is a catastrophe and very disappointing. Here is a little personal anecdote: I used to live in the center of Berlin Mitte when I was a student, had rented a Penthouse apartment for 450 Euro/mo incl. additional costs (but without water, gas, electricity). It was affordable. Then a Bavarian multimillionaire bought the house from the original owners. I was already abroad most of the time, so I didn't experience the loud works his people conducted to get old renters out. However, he did cut off my telephone cable, something the phone technician realized when I returned and was able to fix. Later he threatened to build a balcony - "and this might take a long time" - unless I agree to pay a higher rent. The classic ugly move. I negotiated with him for a while and in the end the raise was not so bad. However, I realized that I have to get out anyway - he wouldn't stop until I'd have left, you cannot fight a landlord with evil intentions in the long run even if you're a member of renter protection like I was. So I left Berlin and never returned, not even for a visit. I never asked but would estimate the same apartment at around 1600 EUR/mo today, with an ever increasing tendency. Now I live in another country, ten years have passed, and the same happens in the city I live in. Rents are rising continuously, I've already seen people photographing the houses in our street, several of them are being totally renovated, new apartments are always "luxury apartments" as if any local could afford these (it's a poor country, ca. 800 EUR average income), and an agent from Sotheby's Real Estate rang my doorbell recently to ask if I'm the owner of my apartment. You cannot escape this trend unless you want to live jobless on the countryside. I'd buy an apartment like most of my colleagues if I had the money, but it would mean having liabilities for the next 20 years and I only have time-limited contracts in Academia. It's frustrating to know there is a real risk I'll have to spend my later years in the most ugly suburbs and slums of an otherwise beautiful town, even though I have a rather decent salary in local terms, while most of these houses with unaffordable "luxury apartments" are bought by foreign investors. By the way, many of the new apartments are empty, apparently only serve as investments.

dna_polymerase 6y ago
So, the bavarian investor who upgraded his property is the bad guy here? While you spend your time abroad, blocking an apartment in Berlin's city center? Sure, low rents from decades ago are nice, but there has to be an equilibrium. Houses depreciate and if the rent is too low there won't be any money left to pay for upkeep. Unless of course, the bavarian millionaire has to take a loss and pay for that out of his own pocket, because eat the rich.
- truckerbill 6y ago
  The op would have sublet presumably at the previous lower rate.
- jonathanstrange 6y ago
  I was not blocking the apartment but travelling back and forth while doing my PhD, during one year. I lived there, and when I was away someone else was taking care of it. The Bavarian investor was definitely the bad guy, he illegally cut telephone cables and threatened me with making my life a misery in a way that was directly against German rent law. I had to consult with the lawyer from the rent protection association (Mieterschutzbund) who told me it might be better to keep an agreement with him since they only pursue lawsuits in more drastic cases - unfortunately such harassing is normal, although in the end illegal. The rent was not too low, it was perfectly okay for the previous owners and I can assure you they did not lose money. They made enough money to pay a company full-time to take care of the building and relations to the renters. They merely earned normal amounts instead of seeking a 1000% return on their investment like the guy from Bavaria. There are greedy and fair house owners, it's as simple as that.
DangerousPie 6y ago
I think it's the opposite. The rent cap (at least in the way it was implemented) achieved nothing to solve the problems that exist in the Berlin rental market. It led to a huge decrease in rental supply. Yes, rent may have been cheap for the few people who managed to get a place, but it was a lottery with dozens of applicants for each flat. This mismatch of supply and demand is exactly the kind of thing that would be solved through pricing in normal markets. And rents rising as a city becomes a more desirable place to live just makes perfect sense. If you are convinced that this will happen in your city maybe now would be a great time to buy a place?
- yladiz 6y ago
  > It led to a huge decrease in rental supply. This was artificial though, as landlords were waiting to know the outcome of this ruling. It's not like the apartments just vanished from existence.
  - DangerousPie 6y ago
    Sure, but I don't think it would have gone back to 100% if this law hadn't been overturned, since the law made it much more attractive to keep a property empty in order to sell it at some point.
    - llampx 6y ago
      Empty apartments are more attractive for buyers but if your intention is to rent it anyway, it wouldn't have made a difference, as the Mietendeckel ensured you couldn't rent it for more than what the previous tenant was paying.
- goodpoint 6y ago
  > This mismatch of supply and demand is exactly the kind of thing that would be solved through pricing in normal markets. The very opposite. The market optimizes for maximum profitability, not for maximum savings for renters or best quality of life. There's a reason why governments have been building cheap housing across the last 100 years in most developed countries.
radu_floricica 6y ago
This reminds me of the dispute on liberalizing parking space prices. An uber driver last week was super against it, saying it's not fair. His main argument? He has a price protected one. Meanwhile I do the 10 minute parking dance every evening, while going past paid, reserved and unused parking spots. (Bucharest btw, and they'll likely stay this way)
- varispeed 6y ago
  For two years I had to drive for 1-3 hours after work each working day to find space, just because our local authority decided to make paid parking as a pilot on most streets in the area and mine was not included, so everyone tried to park on those limited free streets and I couldn't get a permit for pilot ones. The paid ones of course were mostly empty and that put enormous stress on the few free ones. Complete lack of imagination from people who planned this and residents were not consulted.
  - userulluipeste 6y ago
    This is something that irks me too. If you're an authority implementing paid parking, price it appropriately so that most of the potential clients would rather chose to park and pay instead of hunting for free parking in some other parts of the city. Once you have that parking lot full most of the time, only then you may juggle around with the price in order to bring it closer to a more desirable level.
fy20 6y ago
> Now I live in another country, ten years have passed, and the same happens in the city I live in. The same is happening in my city (Baltics) too. We bought a new apartment 5 years ago in the city centre, at the time we paid €2250/m2 which was quite a lot. Now I'm seeing the standard price for new apartments being double that. The typical salary here is around €1000/mo[1], so these apartments are completely unaffordable to most people. We were actually looking to upgrade (as we have a 1br apartment and now a kid), but we wouldn't be able to afford to buy a bigger apartment. Instead we bought land and are building a house on the outskirts of the city. We got lucky there too, as we completed the purchase right before COVID and apparently land prices have gone up a lot now. You can still find barely affordable (usually older) apartments further out of the city, but if you want to live anywhere close to the centre you need to be earning a salary a good few multiples higher than the average. [1] Thats for the country as a whole, but salaries vary a lot in different regions, so maybe for where I am it's higher.
protontorpedo 6y ago
Renting a penthouse/dachgeschoss apartment in Mitte costs more like 2k nowadays.

dna_polymerase 6y ago

So, the bavarian investor who upgraded his property is the bad guy here? While you spend your time abroad, blocking an apartment in Berlin's city center? Sure, low rents from decades ago are nice, but there has to be an equilibrium. Houses depreciate and if the rent is too low there won't be any money left to pay for upkeep. Unless of course, the bavarian millionaire has to take a loss and pay for that out of his own pocket, because eat the rich.

truckerbill 6y ago
The op would have sublet presumably at the previous lower rate.
jonathanstrange 6y ago
I was not blocking the apartment but travelling back and forth while doing my PhD, during one year. I lived there, and when I was away someone else was taking care of it. The Bavarian investor was definitely the bad guy, he illegally cut telephone cables and threatened me with making my life a misery in a way that was directly against German rent law. I had to consult with the lawyer from the rent protection association (Mieterschutzbund) who told me it might be better to keep an agreement with him since they only pursue lawsuits in more drastic cases - unfortunately such harassing is normal, although in the end illegal. The rent was not too low, it was perfectly okay for the previous owners and I can assure you they did not lose money. They made enough money to pay a company full-time to take care of the building and relations to the renters. They merely earned normal amounts instead of seeking a 1000% return on their investment like the guy from Bavaria. There are greedy and fair house owners, it's as simple as that.

DangerousPie 6y ago

I think it's the opposite. The rent cap (at least in the way it was implemented) achieved nothing to solve the problems that exist in the Berlin rental market. It led to a huge decrease in rental supply. Yes, rent may have been cheap for the few people who managed to get a place, but it was a lottery with dozens of applicants for each flat. This mismatch of supply and demand is exactly the kind of thing that would be solved through pricing in normal markets. And rents rising as a city becomes a more desirable place to live just makes perfect sense. If you are convinced that this will happen in your city maybe now would be a great time to buy a place?

yladiz 6y ago
> It led to a huge decrease in rental supply. This was artificial though, as landlords were waiting to know the outcome of this ruling. It's not like the apartments just vanished from existence.
- DangerousPie 6y ago
  Sure, but I don't think it would have gone back to 100% if this law hadn't been overturned, since the law made it much more attractive to keep a property empty in order to sell it at some point.
  - llampx 6y ago
    Empty apartments are more attractive for buyers but if your intention is to rent it anyway, it wouldn't have made a difference, as the Mietendeckel ensured you couldn't rent it for more than what the previous tenant was paying.
goodpoint 6y ago
> This mismatch of supply and demand is exactly the kind of thing that would be solved through pricing in normal markets. The very opposite. The market optimizes for maximum profitability, not for maximum savings for renters or best quality of life. There's a reason why governments have been building cheap housing across the last 100 years in most developed countries.

radu_floricica 6y ago

This reminds me of the dispute on liberalizing parking space prices. An uber driver last week was super against it, saying it's not fair. His main argument? He has a price protected one. Meanwhile I do the 10 minute parking dance every evening, while going past paid, reserved and unused parking spots. (Bucharest btw, and they'll likely stay this way)

varispeed 6y ago
For two years I had to drive for 1-3 hours after work each working day to find space, just because our local authority decided to make paid parking as a pilot on most streets in the area and mine was not included, so everyone tried to park on those limited free streets and I couldn't get a permit for pilot ones. The paid ones of course were mostly empty and that put enormous stress on the few free ones. Complete lack of imagination from people who planned this and residents were not consulted.
- userulluipeste 6y ago
  This is something that irks me too. If you're an authority implementing paid parking, price it appropriately so that most of the potential clients would rather chose to park and pay instead of hunting for free parking in some other parts of the city. Once you have that parking lot full most of the time, only then you may juggle around with the price in order to bring it closer to a more desirable level.

fy20 6y ago

> Now I live in another country, ten years have passed, and the same happens in the city I live in. The same is happening in my city (Baltics) too. We bought a new apartment 5 years ago in the city centre, at the time we paid €2250/m2 which was quite a lot. Now I'm seeing the standard price for new apartments being double that. The typical salary here is around €1000/mo[1], so these apartments are completely unaffordable to most people. We were actually looking to upgrade (as we have a 1br apartment and now a kid), but we wouldn't be able to afford to buy a bigger apartment. Instead we bought land and are building a house on the outskirts of the city. We got lucky there too, as we completed the purchase right before COVID and apparently land prices have gone up a lot now. You can still find barely affordable (usually older) apartments further out of the city, but if you want to live anywhere close to the centre you need to be earning a salary a good few multiples higher than the average. [1] Thats for the country as a whole, but salaries vary a lot in different regions, so maybe for where I am it's higher.

protontorpedo 6y ago

Renting a penthouse/dachgeschoss apartment in Mitte costs more like 2k nowadays.