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Four ways to lower your rent in Germany

It’s often expats in Germany who find themselves paying unduly high rent, but that doesn’t mean you can’t get a better deal - even if you’ve already signed your tenancy agreement.

Published: 20 August 2019 10:16 CEST

Photo: Chrissi/Depositphotos

When you’re looking for accommodation in a competitive rental market, it might seem like there’s no option other than to accept whatever rent the landlord is asking for. In actual fact, Germany’s rental market is highly regulated and knowing your rights will often get you a fairer price.

Here’s how to make sure your tenancy agreement is compliant with German rental laws – and what to do if it isn’t.

Read up on Mietpreisbremse

In the summer of 2015, Germany introduced a law to cap how much landlords in urban areas could charge above the rental average or Mietspiegel. Aimed at slowing down the pace of rental increases, Meitpreisbremse stipulates that new rental contracts cannot exceed 10 percent of the average price of an apartment in the area. You do need to meet certain criteria to be eligible, which you can read more about here.

You might ask why, if this law exists, you still hear of people paying extortionate rent? It’s because the law does have a fatal flaw. Landlords who don’t follow it aren’t penalised and so many have actively ignored it. As a result, publicly-available data from ImmobilienScout24 shows that every second tenancy agreement in Germany is unlawful.

For expats, the situation is even worse: The tenants’ rights portal wenigermiete.de has analysed more than 2,500 rental contracts from expats that were submitted to its website and found that 83 percent have illegally high rent. The reason for this isn’t entirely clear but it could be that German landlords are aware that many expats don’t know their rights. On the other hand, expats may be used to paying higher rent in their home countries and so unaware they are being overcharged.

Familiarising yourself with Meitpreisbremse is the first step to making sure you get a fair deal when you sign a tenancy agreement. And it’s never too late to invoke it – even if you have already signed a lease, you can challenge it if you discover your rent is too high.

Click here to calculate if your rent is illegally high

Know your options: Online portal, tenancy association, local lawyer

If your rent is illegally high, you don’t have to keep quiet and cut your losses. German rental law favours the tenant and there are several ways to lower the amount you’re paying.

To start with, there is the team at Berlin-based online portal/legal-tech startup wenigermiete.de. Once you have filled in their online questionnaire to determine whether you are eligible for a rent reduction, they handle your case from there. The website makes the saving calculation based on the official rental index of each city and about 30-50 detailed questions regarding your apartment. If you answer those questions accurately, chances are high that you can save the calculated amount. The portal’s team will act on your behalf to lower your rent, representing you in court if necessary. You only pay if they are successful and even then their fee comes out of the security deposit you’ve already paid to your landlord.

Alternatively, you could contact your local tenants’ union which will support you in approaching your landlord and challenging the illegal contract yourself. This often involves you attending on-site appointments. If the landlord does not react, the tenancy association will refer you to a lawyer. This may cost you a deductible of €150 – however, in Berlin, the association often waives the fee.

Your third option is to hire a lawyer from the outset, just be aware that even the initial consultation can cost up to €190 per hour – and that’s just to evaluate whether you have a case or not. It’s not unheard of for people to pay the €190 only for a lawyer to advise them against taking action as their case has a low chance of success.

Don’t fear contract termination

It’s understandable to worry that challenging your contract might lead your landlord to terminate your lease or cease maintaining the property. But the fact is, they have no legal leg to stand on.

If your tenancy agreement is with a property management company and you have complied with all the contractual obligations then there is no legal way for them to cancel your lease. If you are renting from a private landlord, the only legal termination can be on the grounds of the landlord needing the property for themselves or their family members. Several conditions must be met for them to claim the property for their own use and, often, if a private landlord issues such a notice it is preventable. wenigermiete.de will look over this and and other termination notices.

Most landlords already know that they are breaching rent control law in the first place. They will be cautious if they receive a letter signed by a lawyer so wenigermiete.de ensures every claim letter is signed by a contract lawyer that works closely with the portal.

Reject your next rent increase

The most sensible thing you can do when renting in Germany is stay clued up. There are laws in place to protect you, but you need to know them to use them to your advantage.

For example, the law also prohibits steep rises in rent over a short period of time. Landlords are not permitted to increase your rent more than 15 percent over a three-year period and it still cannot exceed the rent index (the same rent index used for rent control but without applying the 10 percent addition). wenigermiete.de also helps you check and dispute rent increase letters.

You’re also protected if your rental property is repaired or modernized. Until last year, landlords could reclaim 11 percent of the cost of the repairs or refurbishment, but as of 2019 they can only reclaim eight percent annually. This has been one of the biggest issues faced by tenants in Germany who would be unable to pay the unexpectedly higher rent.

If you suspect your rental contract is against German rent control law you can can call wenigermiete.de‘s free hotline under 030 2844 3300 (Monday to Friday 9am to 7pm)

This article was produced by The Local Creative Studio and sponsored by Wenigermiete.

10 essential tips for avoiding rental scams in Germany

When it comes to settling in Germany, one of the most stressful and difficult tasks you’re likely to face is finding a place to live.

With the country in the grip of an ever-worsening housing shortage, there aren’t enough rental properties to meet the high demand – especially in big cities like Berlin, Munich and Frankfurt – and the flats that are available can often stretch even the most healthy of budgets.

With renters desperate to find affordable homes, crafty scammers have seized the chance to place fake ads on the market, often in dream locations with lower-than-average rents.

While some of these scams may be easy to spot, others can be highly sophisticated, with fraudsters setting up professional-looking websites and even allowing hopeful tenants to view their properties in person.

Recently The Local reported on a Polish couple who lost around €7,000 through a rental scam in Berlin. The scammers had sublet a beautiful Altbau apartment in the popular district of Neukölln and created an advert for it via a fake letting agent website, then arranged for people to use a key box to view the property while the real tenants were away.

Despite checking the contract over with legal experts from their local tenants’ association, nobody saw anything out of the ordinary – that is, until they tried to access the apartment and found a family already living there.

So, how do you protect your hard-earned savings and steer clear of scammers while looking for a new home?

Here are 10 important ways to protect yourself from rental scams.

1. Be alert to suspicious signs

The key to avoiding scammers in Germany is to be fully clued up on the warning signs. Was the listing for the property uploaded in the middle of the night, is the advert thin on details or written in bad German or English, and does the offer feel too good to be true?

Though it would be nice to believe there are still cheap flats to be found, finding an attractive property at an overly reasonable price is usually a red flag.

Hamburg

Modern apartments in Hamburg. Photo: picture alliance/dpa | Daniel Bockwoldt

If someone claiming to be a landlord contacts you out of the blue, that’s also your cue to run a mile. With so many people looking for housing, most letting agents and landlords will have more than people looking to rent their properties without needing to get in touch with people themselves. Anyone who does is more than likely to be a scammer.

2. Rule out landlords who say they live abroad

One of the major warning signs to look out for is a landlord who claims to be renting the property from abroad, or who says they are out of the country for other reasons, like a last-minute business trip.

That’s usually a scammer’s way of excusing the fact that they won’t be able to meet you personally or even show you the property before you rent it.

“When the country the landlord lives in appears then I would say there’s a really big chance this is a scam,” said Kuba Rudzinski, one of the victims of the Berlin-Neukölln rental fraud.

Even if the excuse seems plausible, your best bet is to ignore anyone who tries to sell you a story about living abroad and simply move on with your house hunt.

3. Do your research online

Before committing to anything, take time to do some thorough research to scope out the property, landlord and letting agent.

Running the pictures and text used in apartment listings through a search engine like Google will help you quickly identify stock photos and text stolen from other listings. For pictures, this is known as a reverse image search.

A laptop

Photo by 2H Media on Unsplash

It’s also worth checking that any websites you’re sent to are fully functional and not copies of other letting agent sites, and that any email addresses match the website domain.

4. Visit the property and ask around

Never agree to rent a property without seeing it in person first. Arrange a viewing and take the opportunity to ask questions about the property and the neighbourhood.

Kuba also recommends speaking with the neighbours in the building to check if the property is genuinely being rented.

“Go to the place before and ask the neighbours, is this flat really for rent? Because these people generally know,” he said. “You’ll need to convince yourself to do it of course, but just ask in the building, ask on the floor where the flat is.”

5. Don’t transfer the full deposit in advance

Advance payments for anything, whether it’s furniture, a deposit or getting a chance to view the property, should be considered a major red flag.

Under German law, you are usually only expected to pay the deposit by the start of the agreed rental contract – and certainly not several months in advance.

Euro notes lie next to some house keys on a table.

Euro notes lie next to some house keys on a table. Photo: picture alliance/dpa/dpa-tmn | Andrea Warnecke

You are also legally entitled to pay your three months’ deposit in three instalments on top of your first three months’ rent after moving in, so definitely be cautious of landlords that place pressure on you to transfer a large lump sum.

If you’re really concerned, look into alternatives for paying your deposit, such as Kautionversicherung (deposit insurance) or a Mietkautionssparbuch, where you open a bank account and pledge the amount to the landlord, rather than transferring the money directly.

6. Insist on meeting the landlord or letting agent in person

If a landlord or letting agent refuses to meet you in person or insists on conducting all communication online, they’re probably not who they say they are.

Insist on meeting face-to-face to verify their identity and ensure they have a legitimate connection to the property.

7. Avoid sending documents straight away

Not all rental scams are about getting money from you directly: many scammers are simply after your personal details for the purposes of identity theft.

Be wary of providing personal documents or sensitive information before you’ve verified the legitimacy of the rental agreement, especially when it comes to things like passport scans or other forms of ID.

8. Seek legal advice from experts

If you’re unsure about any aspect of the rental agreement or if something seems suspicious, seek advice from legal experts or tenants’ associations.

However, be aware that this isn’t always a cast-iron guarantee that a tenancy is legitmate. Over the past few years, fraudsters have become increasingly sophisticated, even down to producing water-tight rental contracts for would-be tenants.

An estate agent hands over keys to an apartment. Photo: picture alliance/dpa/dpa-tmn | Christin Klose

According to civil lawyer Emilia Tintelnot, becoming a member of a tenants’ association can be a good way to get affordable legal advice, and it can also be helpful to set up legal insurance to ensure you can access help when you need it without having to pay lawyers’ fees up front.

9. Be wary of stereotypes

Avoid making assumptions based on stereotypes or preconceived notions about someone’s gender or nationality, as this may cause you to overlook things you might otherwise see as warning signs.

In Kuba’s case, the fact that the fraudsters were German made them appear more legitimate in his eyes, as Polish people tend to see Germans as law-abiding and trustworthy.

Be aware that scammers can come from any cultural background and may use a variety of tactics to deceive unsuspecting renters.

10. Keep an extensive paper trail

Document all communication, agreements, and transactions related to the rental process, including phone numbers and any bank details provided.

According to the Berlin police, this type of evidence can be crucial for an investigation if you do suspect a scammer.

While evidence can differ across cases, “pictures, contact details used by the perpetrators, original documents, bank details with payment receipts” are particularly helpful for investigators, and could help the police stop the scammers for good.

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