If the job breaks down due to the Corona crisis, tenants face the loss of income as well as the loss of their home. The tenants' association would therefore like to suspend layoffs. Instead, the owners' association sees the state as an obligation.
Berlin (dpa) - In order to cushion the consequences of the corona crisis, the left and the tenants' association are demanding state support for tenants in need.
On Tuesday in Berlin, the German Tenants' Association advocated, among other things, excluding layoffs for the time of the crisis and allowing the rent to be deferred. The left-wing faction in the Bundestag also calls for nationwide freezing of rents as well as a stop to evictions and a ban on electricity and water closures.
The virus pandemic will particularly affect those who are already suffering from the rent explosion, Caren Lay, spokeswoman for housing affairs, writes in a joint paper. Tenant Association President Lukas Siebenkotten warned: "Freelancers, small businesses, artists and people who are affected by short-time work or job loss must fear that they will lose their homes due to the Corona crisis."
The Federal Working Group of Real Estate Associations called on affected tenants to inform the respective landlord as soon as possible about impending loss of income. This means that an individual solution can be sought at an early stage. "Now it is more than ever a matter of common sense among contractual partners, who mostly have a longstanding, harmonious tenancy relationship," said association head Axel Gedaschko.
The owner association Haus & Grund, however, refers to the state housing benefit. "Many tenants are not even aware that the state is helping people with low incomes to continue paying their rent," said Association President Kai Warnecke. He called on the federal government to provide sufficient funds for this in the federal budget and to provide appropriate reserves.
Instead, the left wants an emergency aid program that benefits both tenants and small owners and the homeless. Because they are often those who not only have low incomes, "but also exist without fixed employment contracts, have to go to work in addition to the poverty pension or just keep afloat as self-employed or shopkeepers," write Lay and Kuhn. "Surviving the Corona crisis as a tenant must not depend on the grace of the respective landlord."
Left faction demands
Press release from the German Tenants' Association
Press release from the real estate industry
Press release from Haus & Grund
