New Ordinance: This gives Berlin households faster access to apartments!

New Ordinance: This gives Berlin households faster access to apartments!

In a dramatic step to combat the housing crisis, the Berlin Senate has passed a new regulation that enables hundreds of thousands of households to achieve cheaper rents in social housing. With the introduction of the new residential authorization certificate (WBS 220), more people can get support in the overpriced housing market in Berlin. This was reported by Birgit Bürkner on BZ Berlin

a new hope for many Berliners

In order to lower the financial hurdles, the new WBS 220 allows an income to be exceeded up to 120 percent beyond the previously set limits. This means that one -person households with an annual income of up to 26,400 euros and two -person households up to 39,600 euros can be entitled to these apartments. According to this new regulation, around 1,167,900 households in Berlin can now be entitled to social housing, an enormous increase of 310,900 compared to the previous figures. Nevertheless, the reality remains tough: over 857,000 households are fighting for only 3,000 new rental apartments that will be available in the next few years.

The situation is alarming in view of the nationwide rental price increases. According to the German Tenants' Association , more than 3.1 million households are to spend over 40 percent of their income on rent and heating costs. An average rental budget in Germany lives on only 69 m² of living space, which is far below the national average. At the same time, the offer rents in Berlin rose by terrifying 27 percent between November 2022 and February 2023. The dramatic decline in social housing does the rest: around 45,000 of these apartments fall out of the bond every year, while less than a third of the newly built apartments are classified as affordable rental apartments. The hope of improving the living situation for financially stressed households remains an unfulfilled dream.