More and more apartments are being finished in Germany. But the numbers remain below the federal government's goal. Now the corona crisis brings new challenges.
Wiesbaden (dpa) - Housing construction in Germany has picked up momentum in 2019 and has reached its highest level in almost 20 years.
With 293,000 apartments built, an increase of 2.0 percent compared to the previous year, the upward trend of the past years continued, the Federal Statistical Office in Wiesbaden said. The number of completed apartments was last higher in 2001 (326,600). While a particularly large number of apartments were built in apartment buildings, there was hardly any increase in apartment buildings and condominiums.
Despite the progress in construction, the completions remain well below the federal government's goals. She had made 1.5 million new apartments in the current term - 375,000 a year. In order to meet the great demand for real estate and to combat the housing shortage in cities, politicians and the construction industry estimate that 350,000 to 400,000 apartments have to be completed each year. In the past year, construction has now clearly increased again after there was little more than stagnation in 2018.
The fact that no more was built in 2019 was mainly due to the high number of approved but not completed apartments. The "construction overhang" has been growing for years and has already totaled 740,400 apartments, the highest level since 1998. An important reason is that construction companies and tradesmen cannot keep up with the processing of orders. Many regulations also make the work complex.
In recent years, the construction industry has experienced a boom with growth rates, some of which are in double figures. The order books are still well filled, but the corona crisis is also noticeable on construction sites. The Central Association of the German Construction Industry (HDB) expects sales to stagnate at around 135 billion euros this year. While demand in residential construction is still high, orders in private and public construction are breaking down. "At the moment this does not indicate anything good," said HDB President Peter Hübner recently. Hygiene measures on construction sites such as distance rules and shifted shifts as well as a lack of workers at subcontractors do not make work easier.
Many cities are struggling with the same problems in the housing shortage: there is a lack of space for apartments, property prices are skyrocketing and the construction industry is hardly able to keep up. The pressure is reflected in high prices, which later lead to expensive rents.
According to real estate specialist F + B, the corona crisis has hardly changed anything so far. Adverts for rental apartments collapsed in March. However, according to a new analysis, rents and purchase prices hardly moved until the end of May. The measures to contain the pandemic apparently would have no significant impact, said F + B managing director Bernd Leutner. "There was no significant upward price adjustment, nor were" corona discounts "granted for faster marketing of rental and purchase properties."
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