EAn alliance of tenants' associations, construction unions and social and industry associations has called for significantly more apartments for people with low incomes. On Tuesday in Berlin it called for the creation of more than 910,000 social housing units, citing a study by the Pestel Institute in Hanover. “Rising rents, hardly any new construction and no improvement in sight,” commented Lukas Siebenkotten, President of the German Tenants’ Association.
Accordingly, there were around 1.088 million social housing units in Germany at the end of 2022. The “Social Housing” alliance assumes that an increase to 2 million social housing units nationwide will be necessary by 2030 – then the level from 2007 would be roughly reached. According to the study, there is a particularly large lack of social housing – in absolute numbers – in Baden-Württemberg (gap: around 206,000 apartments), Bavaria (around 195,000), Berlin (around 131,000) and Lower Saxony (around 109,000). The federal and state governments have massively neglected the funding of such residential units.
The alliance demanded that the federal and state governments immediately provide 50 billion euros to promote social housing. This is the only way to get a little closer to the traffic light target of 100,000 new social housing units per year. The alliance also spoke out in favor of tax reductions: In the future, 7 percent instead of the current 19 percent VAT should be charged for the construction of new social housing.
Traffic light coalition clearly misses its goal
According to the scientists, in 2023 the state spent a total of more than 20 billion euros in social spending to support needy people with housing for the first time: a good 15 billion euros for the costs of accommodation, which are mainly paid by the job centers, and over five billion Euros for housing benefit. In contrast, federal and state spending on social housing in recent years has only been less than 2.5 billion euros per year, according to the study.
Because of the enormous need, especially in the cities, the SPD, Greens and FDP had targeted the construction of 400,000 new apartments annually in their coalition agreement – 100,000 of which would be social housing. Because of the consequences of the war in Ukraine, the government admitted last year that it would initially miss its target. Scarce materials, a shortage of skilled workers and increased interest rates are among the obstacles.
Rents for social housing are regulated by the state. Only people who the authorities see as having special needs because they have low incomes are allowed to live there. After a certain period of time, the apartments can be rented out normally on the market, which is why the number of social housing units has steadily decreased in recent years.
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