The city-state of Berlin announced this Wednesday the purchase of almost 4,500 apartments from Vonovia, the largest group real estate from Germany, as well as developable land for another 1,200.
With the agreement signed this Tuesday, the regional public company HOWOGE It thus acquires 4,495 apartments, two commercial premises, 873 parking spaces and 47 other types of units in the Lichtenberg district, the Berlin Government states in a statement.
Besides, Berlin will buy a real estate company of which 74% will pass into the hands of HOWEGE and 26% to the also public Berlinovo, which owns 6.9 hectares of potentially developable land in the Buch district.
In this way, the city-state acquires land reserves for around 1,200 apartments in Buchas well as additional redensification potential in Lichtenberg, the statement states.
The total cost of this procurement package Vonovia It amounts to about 700 million euros and will be financed by the two public companies with their own funds and borrowed capital, but not from Berlin’s budgets.
“We want more new housing construction in Berlin, affordable rents and less pressure on the city’s real estate market, under an extremely tense situation. With the acquisition of around 4,500 apartments and the consequent reinforcement of municipal housing, we have taken a great step towards achieving these objectives”, declared the mayor-governor, Kai Wegner.
With this new acquisition, the number of municipally owned homes rises to 366,131, approximately 22% of the 1.7 million rental apartments in the capital, while the city-state’s long-term goal is to reach half a million.
Source: Gestion
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