Guten Morgen aus Deutschland, wo der Markt für Bürogebäude den stärksten Rückgang seit zwei Jahrzehnten erleidet, da höhere Finanzierungskosten und schleppende Trends bei der Rückkehr ins Büro den Appetit der Anleger trüben: Der Abschwung beschleunigte sich im vierten Quartal mit einem Rückgang von 13 % gegenüber dem Vorjahr, wie aus veröffentlichten Daten hervorgeht vom Deutschen Bankenverband VDP. Im Gesamtjahr sind die Preise um mehr als 10 % eingebrochen, der stärkste seit Beginn der Aufzeichnungen im Jahr 2003, und es wird mit weiteren Rückgängen zu Beginn des Jahres 2024 gerechnet.
So what you're saying is
Housing is about to become a lot more available in Germany? Guten Morgen!
No. It's about office buildings, not residental ones. Those remain at a critical state.
Once most of the office buildings are permanently empty, converting them is the obvious choice.
I wonder how obvious of a choice that really is though due to a plethora of regulations and construction costs.
Compared to having a building go unused until it becomes unusable, the construction costs don't seem so bad. For sure, a very large number will sit empty for a long time, though.
No, absolutely not. Strict regulations will make sure that housing stays rare and unaffordable.
Dumb take
Why?
Because absolutely nobody benefits off of it. Property owners lose profit as buildings go unused and become dilapidated. The government gains nothing. Potential buyers lose an opportunity. Who wins?
I can understand the feeling when it seems like the whole system is acting against our interests, and sometimes it really is, but the intentions of regulations are not to reduce housing availability unless regulators somehow benefit from it.
The purpose of a system is what it does.
I'm just very disappointed with the housing politics in Germany. There's a huge gap between the demand and the supply, and a lot of it is held up by the Bauämter and a lot is influenced by the numerous regulations which make housing the most expensive in Germany out of its neighboring European countries where the excuse of expensive labour doesn't come into the picture. Meanwhile living in Berlin, I see new office towers and malls and other commercial real estate popping up much more frequently than housing of similar size. A tower with 500 offices is cool, but where are those 500 people going to live? On top of that, most city officials are against WFH because it reduces their tax base and tax receipts from fewer people ordering or going to lunch, sandwiches in the morning, after-work drinks and so on.
Also my point is that housing stays rare and unaffordable, and a certain class absolutely benefits from that -- the current owners of property. If they can restrict supply, their land retains or appreciates in value. The same people may not be invested in commercial real estate, or may be trying to increase the RTO movement at the same time.
But that only holds true if they're maximizing profit by keeping housing unavailable, because they can also profit off of the office spaces. But if the office spaces become unprofitable and unmaintainable, then their best choices are to either convert or sell, otherwise they are losing out on money. They can't force people to buy, lease, or rent their offices.
We are talking about greedy people. They're not going to intentionally lose money to make your life harder. What this system does is make money for the owners, your suffering is merely a side effect.