Yep, not what I expected either, but I think it goes to show that things can also be different and aren't necessarily bad across the board. You rarely hear some

Yep, not what I expected either, but I think it goes to show that things can also be different and aren't necessarily bad across the board. You rarely hear someone 'complain' that their rent hasn't changed compared to the alternative, so the situation will always sound/feel worse than it is. It's a city of around 50k people in west germany, close to other cities that are much bigger, and my building is less than ten minutes walking from the transport hub that takes you to one of those cities. Without service costs (main constituent: heating), we pay 600 euros for ~100m² (but a bad layout, so it's not all as usable and spacious as another 100m² apartment would be).