Brit Reacts to Why Germans Don’t Buy Houses

[@sookiestackhouse4801]

I pay 765€ for 100qm with 4 rooms in a wonderful part of the town near the forest. It's so so cheap and so easy. 😊 When something is broken, I call my landlord and he fix it.

[@leDespicable]

I think a lot of the differences also come down to how Germans view renting. In many countries (especially the US), renting is seen as a temporary thing that you do until you find something better, while in Germany, people do view their apartments as a permanent home, *their* home. That's why long-term renting is so common in Germany as well, and probably also one of the reasons why Germans take everything (including light fixtures and their kitchen) with them when they move. You want your home to look the way you like, even when it's a rental place. You don't want someone else's kitchen and light fixtures there that you probably don't like. At the end of the day, Germans also just don't like spending money they don't have. And, since buying your own home almost always requires taking out a loan, not many Germans do it, since being in debt is frowned upon in German culture.

[@reinhard8053]

Buying a house is probably the only reason for a credit which is seen as OK. You really have something of value which will probably hold the value in contrary to e.g. a car or a vacation. But you need to have a larger sum of money upfront to get a credit. And even that is a problem for many people.

[@carla3562]

Hey, you're back! All the best for 2024 🎉

[@josefineseyfarth6236]

So what if I tell you that I only pay a 350€ monthly rent for an 80m² 3-room flat with a garden? Yes, in Germany. But in a small town and my landlords are not commercial, but private persons who live in the ground floor of the house and we got the first floor. Of course you also need to calculate the monthly pay for gas heating and energy, which adds up to about 270€ on top. But still, compared to the UK or even other German cities, that's pretty cheap.

[@ruthw4697]

In Germany buying, selling and buying again would cost an additional 10 -15% of the price of the house in taxes and fees. Therefore people normally buy only once in their life.

[@nasenfant]

I am a German and renting an apartment. The rent is 595 EUR for a 3-room, kitchen, and bathroom apartment with a size of 70 square meters. That's why I rent; in my case, it's really fair, and I can move elsewhere anytime I want. With a house, it's more complicated and much more expensive. Additionally, I have no responsibilities, and for issues that the homeowner needs to address, I can refer to them. I pay rent, and that's it. Less worries.

[@WirrWicht]

I pay almost exact her stated average for a 100 square meters 3 bed room (4 room, plus 20 square meters of storage space in the cellar and attic) apartment.

[@Rick2010100]

Germans Don’t Buy Houses??? The German house market is currently completely sold out, only some crazy overpriced rests are still on sale.

[@_qlone]

14:19 There is also a rule that if the rent is too far below the local rent index, the rent must be increased. A letter will then come from the tax office...

[@_qlone]

Happy New Year, all the best and good health. Pretty much everybody in my circle of friends (or maybe my bubble) is a homeowner or an apartment owner or both or serveral. Including me. We all bought our first properties between 25 and 35. And even if one of us moves away again or has moved away, there's the old country saying here: you don't give back land that belongs to you. That means it will only be rented out again, otherwise you won't get anything ;)

[@TH66-95vw]

There's a big thing Feli did't mention: in the last years there haven't been built enough new rental apartments. The Federal Ministry for Housing, Urban Development and Building promised to build every year 400,000 new apartments. In the first ten months of 2023 only 218,100 have been built so the promise failed. On the other hand millions of people moved to Germany and entered the renting market. Especially at the subsidized housing market. Now we have a homing crisis. For exemple in Berlin you often have to compete with 600 other people for a tiny apartement. Normally this would lead to build own houses but the government annouced in april 2023 a new law that you are forced to install a heat pump in every new house and in future years also in every existing house. After this annoucement the homebuilding market nearly collapsed because many people can't afford this. We also have a big increase of taxes and prices. Only new apartements with high rents are still profitable for the owners and if you have enough money to afford to own a house you can still do it or rent one of them. Because of this the ratio of renting to owning didn't change that much. It's only a shift from living in an apartment to not moving to another city. This leads to the problem that even if you would earn a lot of money you can't move to cities like Berlin or Munich because there are no available apartments to rent. And to buy a house for a new job is a big risk. For students it's the same. They often have to choose their university relating to the housing market.

[@klarasee806]

Happy New Year! 🎉

[@m.h.6470]

It also a very regional thing (Feli mentioned it in the video). For example, I currently live in the south-west of Germany and there is a tradition of building your own house here. There is even a common saying, which displays that tradition: "Schaffe, schaffe, Häusle baue" ("work, work, and build a house"). My parents (who also live in the south-west) are generally looked at like people from Mars, when people hear, that they only rent (my parents did not originally come from the south-west, so they don't have the same mindset). I myself rented my first flat after uni, but now live in my own flat, that I bought myself about 8 years ago.

[@not7205]

In calculation I need 80k-120k per year just for the house of approx. 120 m² alone for energy, gas, garbage, grey-/bad-water, rain-water, taxes, etc... it is just ridiculus

[@MellonVegan]

4:40 Absolutely! One of my mates lives maybe a half hour to an hour drive away from the next city somewhere in Lower Saxony and he owns half a dozen buildings, including the local train station buildings. I mean, he does have an upper class salary (over 100k a year) and buying all the cheaper places was a financial mistake but even the house he lives in (3 story building comprising 3 medium to large flats, which you could also just use as one unit, garage, car port, good condition btw, a barn larger than the house and enough land to feed 3 families and then some if you wanted to grow it all yourself) he got for 300k. Houses don't even start at 300k in the city where I live. Where he lived before that, he got 2 adjacent 3 story houses (in need of repairs though) for 100k. The difference is just ridiculous. It's all about location. All of NRW is probably expensive af bc all of NRW is essentially one big city. Munich. though, is the most expensive place in Germany to buy a house, by far! Might be close to twice as dear as the next most expensive area. And then there's the East, which is as empty as (or emptier than) Lower Saxony or Schleswig Holstein but also poor.

[@josefineseyfarth6236]

Der Osten ist weder "leer" noch "arm". Tatsächlich beobachte ich, wie immer mehr aus dem "Westen" in den "Osten" ziehen, einfach weil das Leben im Osten lebenswerter und die Menschen freundlicher sind, entgegen dem was in den Staatsmedien gern behauptet wird. Und ja, ich bedauere es jeden Tag, aus dem Osten in den Westen gezogen zu sein!

[@arnodobler1096]

I have been paying €420 including additional costs for my 40sqm attic apartment with a balcony for 10 years now! Lake Constance

[@9_ha_9]

700€ for a one-bedroom apartment actually seems pretty high to me. like, I'm currently living in a shared flat (two people, so it's technically a two-bedroom apartment, even though each person can just use one) and the rent, including heating and warm water, but not electricity, internet etc., is just below 600€. I guess rent control is doing a fair amount of work for that, even though you should pay attention to your rental contract, as some landlords might not abide to it. I for example had to sue my landlord, bc they set the rent way over what they were allowed to. it also depends on the city you're living in; I live in Eastern Germany, but since Western Germany constitutes the bigger part of the country and rent is for the most part much higher there than here, I guess 700€ make sense..? idk still sounds a bit pricey to me, like, come on - we're still talking about a ONE-bedroom apartment..^^'

[@PPfilmemacher]

Happy new year

[@Felix-st2ue]

The conceot of a housing ladder doesn't really exist in germany. If you buy a house you plan to stay there until they carry you out of it.

[@karlineschlenkerbein131]

Feli tends to overaccentuate the German mentality reasons here, but really quickly skipped the question of transaction costs. Every time you want to buy ahouse, you have to pay a tax between 3,5-6,5%, so the average price of 320.000 € in her video comes with a extra cost of 11.000-20.000 €, each time. And if you didn't stay in that house for at least 10 years and had a little Appartment or a evenjust a single room rented out, an additional speculation tax is due. All these taxes make "climbing up the housing ladder" like in the UK or the US very expensive and that is the main reason, why people tend to stay in their houses for decades, even if the house becomes much to big after the children moved out.Germany disencourages people from moving out and selling houses to families with this housing policy.

[@chakra7100]

The reason is very simple. The germans buy their house to stay, if possible). There is no thing like starter homes, really. The people hold their money for the big through (in their own financial possibilities)

[@MrJueKa]

The idea behind why people rent more than buy in Germany is actually quite simple: if you rent an apartment or house, the owner continues to be financially responsible for all damage and its repairs, and that can sometimes be very expensive.

[@dietrichengel2149]

Munic is a bad example. It is the most expecive city in Germany. In other areas it is much better. We bulid our house in 2006 and, like many others, we are are wery happy to own a house.

[@arnodobler1096]

Immobilie might imobil There are poorer southern European countries that have over 90% home ownership.🤷‍♂️

[@MellonVegan]

Honestly, the thought that more money in a country means more home ownership doesn't make much sense to me. I mean, who is more likely to rent? Someone living in a rich, densely populated city or someone living in a shack in the middle of nowhere? You'll find the highest rate of home ownership in the EU in its poorest country, Romania.

[@SirBSpecial]

350€/month for 50m², water and garbage included! No need to say more.

[@jorgpeters7244]

Thats only because many young people just throw away their money for shit they dont need at all. Like expensive Cellphones every year, every second year a new car. I think they are too stupid to have money for a house. I have a house for me alone.

[@Attirbful]

I currently own two houses in Germany. One, I bought and lived in with my brother (who has died since), and the other, I inherited from my parents when they died. I had pressured my parents to buy a house when I was 14 and they eventually were very happy, as we now had more space and the house eventually, after paying off the mortgage was our own property, with which we could do what we wanted. I bought the house with my brother for pretty much the same reason. We felt that paying rent which would then be gone, was not good. It made more sense to us to buy and then possess. The mortgage is almost paid off now and I am planning to sell it and move into my parents‘ house when it is renovated. It is my security for old age. Although I have a good job, as an academic working at a university, I was tenured rather late and my pension is not going to be great. I am happy to have a property to sell to make up for the lack in pension and to not have to sweat old age… But Feli is right: few of my peers even begun thinking about buying a house until they were in their late thirties or early fourties, as mortgages can be crushing, esp. after the bank failures in 2008… I also have friends who prefer to live in rentals and spend their money rather on extended travel etc. Whatever makes one‘s boat float….

[@jorgpeters7244]

And munich is not beautiful, I would never move there for money.

[@Gurkenhundbob]

A great new jear also from Germany ⚫🔴🟡