Kids don't generally own houses, and at one time they made up a sizeable portion of the German population. You can have a "shrinking" population, but still a g

Kids don't generally own houses, and at one time they made up a sizeable portion of the German population. You can have a "shrinking" population, but still a growing adult population - and you would expect more demand for housing (and smaller household size) from this alone. German birthrates have been steadily declining for a long time. Declining birth rates and immigration (mostly to make up for that) probably plays as big a role on demand as family formation.