Berlin referendum to crack down on rent-seeking, Hong Kong needs housing justice more

The German general election is almost settled. After the outside world is concerned about the political, economic and diplomatic development of Germany after Merkel, who has served as Chancellor for 16 years, the citizens of Berlin, the German capital, are also undergoing a "housing justice" housing reform. sports.

On the same day of the German election (27th), Berlin held a referendum campaign to promote the implementation of the "Land Resumption Regulations" granted by the German Constitution by the city government to fight for affordable housing (Affortable Housing).

According to Article 14 and Article 15 of the German Constitution, all land in Germany can be requisitioned for public use through nationalization or public ownership.

Those who proposed this referendum hope to expropriate 3,000 properties from local real estate giants through the "Land Resumption Ordinance", and provide an additional 243,000 units for local public housing, as well as to stabilize local rents that have been increasing in recent years.

Although the relevant referendum bill is not legally binding, the referendum received more than 56.4% of the votes.

This movement, which has always been considered "extreme" to solve monopolistic behavior in the real estate market, has been on the political agenda of the listed government and can be expected to be gradually implemented.

Rent-seeking behavior of real estate giants

The background of this referendum movement is naturally to solve the growing housing shortage in Berlin, but more importantly, it is to eradicate the growing rent-seeking behavior of local real estate developers.

In the past ten years, Berlin’s rental prices have more than doubled.

This is of course because Berlin, with a population of 3.7 million, has more than 80% of the population dependent on the rental market.

However, with the migration of more than 350,000 people in the past 10 years, the shortage of local housing supply has increased. The local housing market is facing a shortage of more than 200,000 units, and structural housing shortages have emerged as a result.

German General Election: The picture shows on September 26, German voters lined up outside the German General Election Station in the capital Berlin.

(AP)

Although the local government has been implementing the government's housing plan to solve the problem, the situation has not improved.

This is mainly because the relevant housing projects have been encountering different obstacles and are facing serious lags.

Part of the reason is also that large-scale developers are unwilling to cooperate with the government to build housing plans at reasonable prices. They prefer to develop the land into luxury and high-end apartment units for profit.

Among them, the local real estate giant Deutsche Wohnen acquired more than 110,000 residential properties for lease in Berlin, thereby obtaining huge rental returns and monopolizing most of the supply of rental properties.

This referendum campaign hopes to repossess part of the properties for public housing purposes under the "Land Resumption Regulations" granted by the German Constitution, and forcing developers to use the compensation money obtained from the expropriation as funds for housing development, thereby eliminating real estate. Monopoly and rent-seeking issues of merchants.

Government intervention is the only way to correct market imbalances

As countries around the world experience fatigue and economic recession, different governments have taken more active measures to solve market imbalances, especially the monopoly and rent-seeking problems of real estate developers.

In February of this year, the Berlin city government also introduced measures such as rent freezes to try to solve the problem of local rents soaring.

In the end, the developer appealed and the Supreme Court of Germany ruled that the powers belonged only to the statutory powers of the German Federal Government.

However, this referendum is aimed at solving the local real estate shortage from the root cause.

The referendum attempted to require the city government to intervene in the Berlin real estate market in accordance with the "Land Resumption Regulations" of the German Constitution, thereby ending the monopoly and rent-seeking behavior of various capital groups.

On the same day of the German election (27th), Berlin held a referendum campaign to promote the implementation of the "Land Resumption Regulations" granted by the German Constitution by the city government to fight for affordable housing (Affortable Housing).

(Network screenshot)

Regardless of the success or failure of this policy measure, this referendum has already won the support of most local citizens.

It can be expected that after obtaining more than half of the votes in this referendum, the new German government will more actively intervene in the market and achieve an effective and reasonable housing policy.

Compared with Berlin, the housing problem in Hong Kong is more serious, with countless sub-divided houses, and property prices ridiculously high.

Real estate developers are also hoarding large amounts of agricultural land in the New Territories, and new properties launched on the market are also sold through competitive bidding methods such as "tenders".

In the face of housing shortages, the Hong Kong government has the statutory power to apply the Land Resumption Ordinance to expropriate land for public use. The question is whether officials have learned from the experience of other countries and taken more active measures to help citizens solve their housing needs?

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