Faced with the real estate crisis, Berlin votes by referendum to expropriate houses

Thus, they claim that the companies would be compensated at a price “well below market value”, according to the German public radio and television portal Deutsche Welle.

On the other hand, some jurists assure that if the Berlin Senate approved such a law, it would be the subject of several legal appeals.

For example, in April 2021, the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany overturned the government’s decision to impose a five-year rent ceiling on the city.

Jakob Hans Hien, lawyer for Knathe, one of the capital’s leading real estate companies, argued that an expropriation law would not apply in Berlin and said the goal of targeting only businesses or individuals owning 3,000 assets or more has no legal basis.

In addition, he assured that “compensation ‘well below market value’ would be unconstitutional” because “companies would not only be deprived of their assets, but would also suffer direct economic damage”.

The real estate crisis has worsened in recent years. The city which, five years ago, announced itself as the capital of Europe and positioned itself as one of the cheapest cities to live in, was surrounded by financial speculation and companies started buying spaces for set up their head office.

Currently 80% of Berliners rent and it is assumed that between 2017 and 2030 the city will need at least 200,000 new properties to tackle the housing problem.

Last Wednesday, Berlin took a second step on the problem and bought from the main real estate companies, Deutsche Wohnen and Vonovia, 14,750 homes and 450 premises for 2.5 billion euros (almost 3 billion dollars), in order to ” intervene on rent prices. .

These properties will be distributed among the city’s social housing companies and will be in addition to the other 6,000 social housing units that were purchased in 2019 from the real estate agency Ado Properties.

In this context of growing concern, Berlin has managed to collect in a few months the 175,000 signatures necessary to carry out the referendum next Sunday, and the latest polls suggest that a small majority of voters in the capital would support an expropriation law.

This vote, which will take place on the same day as the federal elections in Germany, represents a rise in tensions since the proposal divides the coalition which governs Berlin: the Left party, of the extreme left, strongly supports it; the Greens have given mixed signals; and the Social Democratic Party rejects it, as do the main opposition parties.