Yes, and that is exactly the reason why the energy transition in the heating sector (insulation, conversion to heat pumps, etc.) is proceeding so slowly in Germany! - The incentives for landlords to invest in energy-saving measures are simply non-existent if increased heating costs (higher gas prices) can always be passed on to the tenants anyway...
There are compounding issues too:
- Most cities, even more pronounced in Western Germany, have lackluster district heating networks — meaning green district heating concepts like in Denmark wouldn't work nearly as well.
- There was a huge privatization wave in the 90s. Residential buildings in many cases now need to make a profit every year. High-capex measures that bring mediocre/hard-to-forecast opex improvements (entirely dependent on the price of fossil gas vs. electricity) like heat pumps are not going to win you fans among profit-driven investors.
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This is why gov's need to start applying minimum energy and water efficiency standards to existing structures and fining registered owners for properties that don't meet those standards. If you can't afford to uplift a property long term, you don't deserve to own it. I rent an old-ass 1960's unit with single pane windows and seals that are fucking decades old (possibly original) so it's a nightmare to heat/cool. The shower uses something like 3-5x as much water as newer properties just to maintain hot water. The boomer owners don't give a shit because why would they? They don't have to live with it and there's nothing to motivate them to change... The amount they charge for rent won't change enough to profit off it anytime soon.
It's illegal to build new properties as inefficient as my rental, with heavy fines and forced remediation for non-compliance, yet every existing structure can get away with efficiency levels that became illegal decades ago and consume significantly more resources than everyone else coz gov's protect capital first and foremost.
This is why the heating bill was so controversial. The old version already included a forced switch of the heating system every 30 years, by going with 65% green energy you basicly force in heat pumps, which cost a lot of money for landlords. If you own your own home that is not a big deal, as you profit from lower heating costs long term. So the poor old lady living in a way to large house along on a tiny pension is really not the problem here.
Anytime I’ve looked into it, energy efficient upgrades rarely pay for themselves if doing it solely for the energy savings. Requiring them would just increase the cost of home ownership. They do often justify the marginal cost increase compared to less efficient options, so if something needs to be done anyway it’s a good idea to go with the more efficient option.
Interestingly enough, Canada tends to offer a lot of grants/rebates for people to do energy efficiency upgrades to their house, but they don’t apply to rental properties. Seems like those kinds of things would be a big benefit for tenants that tend to be paying the utility bills.
That's just a wild guess. Switzerland is facing the same situation and yet, landlords are investing frenetically in the energy transition of their buildings to increase value. We're in a vicious circle of renovation and increasing rents where it has become an everyday struggle to afford rent. At least in thd cities.
Council housing provides housing for 5million Germans. Another 5million live in cooperative housing.
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Germany is also last when it's about ownership in general though. Germans have pretty low net worth considering the country's economic power because they love their Girokonto and their Sparbuch (aka money gets eaten by inflation).
One of the major reasons that no one seems to mention is that renter's are well protected by right's and are nearly impossible to kick out. Rental contracts are usually signed without any expiry on the lease and agents are only allowed to raise rental prices every few years. People are expected to live in their rental for decades, to the point where rentals come without kitchens because people are expected to buy their own and use it for 20 years
Thanks because I was completely confused
I don't understand still... so single property and they live there? Aka, not a landlord?
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Can't it be both? I think property in Germany is fairly concentrated, but I also don't think the CEOs of corporations with many, many houses are renting themselves.
Seriously it is renters vs owners, well in terms of households owning the home. Link from Eurostat:
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/cache/digpub/housing/bloc-1a.html?lang=en
Isn't this the same?
If 6 out of 10 households own and actually live in their owned property, than 60% own and 40% rent.
If someone owns property, but doesn't live in their own property, they are probably renting. Or how do they live?
They live in their own property, but they own more than one property.
It's the same number though. 50.5 % of people in Germany rent the place they live in.
I wasn't confused before, but now I am. You're telling me more than half of Europe owns property? I need to get out of America...
In the EU in 2021, 70 % of the population lived in a household owning their home, while the remaining 30 % lived in rented housing.
The USA is pretty close to Europe in total %.
Me: wait, what about England? …oh! Oh…..
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The UK is still in Europe, but no longer in the EU
I don't understand why it's missed out here
Especially since they included Switzerland, which was never in the EU.
Norway and arguably Iceland should be included as well, and the Balkans. Norway would be same as Sweden, Iceland and Balkans no idea.
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It seems like their is some misunderstanding of the map.
Here is the information that has been provided on Instagram for this post:Being an owner or a tenant of your home is something that differs significantly among the Member States.
In the EU in 2021, 70 % of the population lived in a household owning their home, while the remaining 30 % lived in rented housing. The highest shares of ownership were observed in Romania (95 % of the population lived in a household owning their home), Slovakia (92 %, 2020 data), Hungary (92 %) and Croatia (91 %).
Of all the countries analysed, Switzerland and Germany were the only ones where renting was more common than owning.
FYI there's a duplicate sentence there:
In the EU in 2021, 70 % of the population lived in a household owning their home, while the remaining 30 % lived in rented housing.
There are two kinds of people. Those who can extrapolate from incomplete data.
I know they are out of the club but maybe still interesting.
In England and Wales, the figure for 2021 was 62.5%, down from 64.3% in 2011 (~500k households fewer).
Source: ONS
It's alright, I wouldn't see Turkey in the club either
I wonder if it plays a role in mid/eastern europe that many work in Germany etc and are then able to afford a house in their homecountries.
It's just not common in Germany to buy apartments. People either rent, and if they want to buy, they buy a house. Most apartment buildings belong to big companies and not to smaller landlords, making it also not cheaper or in any way attractive to buy an apartment.
In Eastern Europe apartment ownership is very common on the other hand. All the old Soviet blocks have individual ownership of each apartment in it, and the buildings are maintained by groups of people who own the apartments in that building (I forgot the word, not a native English speaker, sorry. But basically like a union out of each owner in the building, there's monthly meetings to decide stuff etc). Landlords usually will not be big companies like in Germany, but just private persons who have had the apartment in their family for a long time. This also makes it easier to buy an apartment, if you don't want to rent.
It's just very different structures and mentalities. When I still lived in Germany I found it stupid to ever buy an apartment and would have just rented forever, since house prices are astronomical. Now I live in Eastern Europe and it took some time to adjust, but it's really just the norm here to buy or own an apartment at some point in your live and most natives I know here own one, or live in a place that a family member owns.
All the old Soviet blocks have individual ownership of each apartment in it, and the buildings are maintained by groups of people who own the apartments in that building (I forgot the word, not a native English speaker, sorry. But basically like a union out of each owner in the building, there's monthly meetings to decide stuff etc).
The word you're looking for is probably "cooperative"
Most people in Germany simply can't afford to buy an apartment, let alone a house.
Thanks for explaining
I would guess that property prices in big cities are just not as inflated as in central and western Europe.
No, what does is that a lot of the countries sold the government owned houses built in the communist era for cheap to the tenants. So that helps a lot and only happend a generation ago. Germany unfortunatly did not do that and sold the East German housing to mainly west German companies or individuals.
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The homeownership rate declined in 82% of states between 2005 and 2020.
🪦
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the worst states aren't under 50%.
I wouldn't necessarily classify private home ownership as good or bad.
For one, there are different styles of living and if you need something small or need to move a bit more often, renting often makes more sense.
Then there's the more fundamental question if private home ownership actually means exactly that — in many cases, the home is basically still owned by the bank. The mortgage crisis hit really hard in countries with supposedly high home ownership like the US and Spain.
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I constantly see the same title but a different map with different numbers.
I looked up the stats for denmakr
They were basically 50/50 on renting vs owning
But i only found 2015 data.
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Because this is about the EU and no one likes egoistic thinking. And we all know that was the reason for the Brexit, even if it didn’t work out well. 🤡
And as you can see other non EU countries are no included as well.
And the Swiss and Lichtenstein are good partners with the EU for decades now.
