The culture is so much different in México, the first thing you do when you start working is to buy a house even if rents are cheap.
What's the average house price tho
Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent
241–250 of 413 posts
Re: Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent
#242Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Serious question: Why is it not very popular in other countries? Because some countries have much, much worse tenants rights. I moved from Ireland to Germany and in Ireland: * There is basically no protection for rent increases, some people are being told their rent is increasing by 50% * Can't change your apartment. Not allowed to paint the walls, nearly all come with furniture, better make sure you don't damage a…
In Germany: - Rent increase limits - Larger changes need landlord's approval (changing walls and stuff). A lot of smaller stuff can be done on your own and doesn't require asking the landlords. (Many landlords are happy if you want to paint the walls etc., though.) - Only smaller apartments (often intended for students) come usually with furniture - The deposit has to be put on a special, locked bank account. The mon…
Actually IIRC the law was changed so tenants only have to make sure the walls have a neutral appearance (i.e. usually white woodchip wallpaper) when moving out, so they're pretty much free to decorate the place as they want as long as they don't outright demolish or damage the walls.
There used to be a requirement for tenants to renovate the apartment (i.e. thorough cleaning, new wallpaper and white paint) before moving out but that requirement has been reduced to "besenrein" (literally "broom clean", i.e. no rubbish or dirt). Damage to windows and existing fittings etc is deducted from the deposit but tenants have the right to a formal inspection with a signed report to avoid dubious claims.
The "Kautionskonto" (the special bank account) is widespread but not universal. However there are also co-operatives that invest your deposit and actually pass on the interest to you when you move out (these apartments are rare though).
Some specifics on pets: fish and caged pets (e.g. rodents) are generally allowed within normal quantities. Cats require approval but disapproval is practically impossible unless there are very good reasons. Dogs always require approval and disapproval is more likely. Many contracts explicitly allow specific pets (including dogs). If another tenant was given permission for a dog, it's hard or impossible to make a case for forbidding a similar dog. "Kampfhunde" (attack dogs) may be more problematic.
Re: Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent
#243Earlier quoted context omitted.
How does anything on your list stem from owning vs renting? Presumably if you were renting - you would still garden and you or your landlord would still maintain the lawn - your landlord would still maintain the house - you would still be living in the community and therefore motivated to participate in it's government - I don't understand this one at all. Why would a second family suddenly move in if the house was r…
Your points miss both the financial incentive to make things better for your own asset and long term incentive since oftentimes renting makes one more nomadic. Point by point: - You might not garden w/ no equitable return on house value (or at least not build a large gardening setup), and landlords feel the same way in reverse (no benefit to them to do anything beyond the minimum once it's inhabited) - Maintain != im…
> You might not garden w/ no equitable return on house value (or at least not build a large gardening setup)
The return is the experience and joy of gardening, which occurs whether I own or rent.
> landlords feel the same way in reverse (no benefit to them to do anything beyond the minimum once it's inhabited)
I'm willing to pay more in rent for a higher quality residence. A well maintained garden (or the tools to make one) would certainly count towards quality.
> Except you may be more nomadic. Also you missed the GP's use of the word "stakeholder" of which you are considerably less of if you don't own land in the community
Even if I live in a place for a single week, I don't want to live in a shithole for that week. My experience living in a neighborhood makes me a stakeholder, even if I don't own land there.
Re: Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent
#244Earlier quoted context omitted.
It really depends on where you live. I live outside of Philadelphia. My mortgage, taxes and insurance is less than $1200 dollars for a 3 bedroom house. I'd pay at least $1200 to rent a crappy 2 bedroom apartment and rent just keeps going up around here. Consider, even If my homes value stays completely static (according to Zillow it went up a 5 percent this year), in ten years time I will be paying considerably less…
Yes, but there's a reason why the crappy 2br costs as much as your house. That reason might not appeal to you, but it exists and has a specific monetary value.
Arbitrage primarily. Development of inexpensive housing is restricted tightly here. I lived in those apartments, everyone there wishes to own but they simply lack the credit history and down payment.
Re: Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent
#245Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a ridiculous position. My ownership of my home provides a lot of active investment activity that wouldn't happen otherwise: Examples: - the local nursery benefits from the plants and growing materials that we buy - investments in home improvements generate contractor man-hours and local material purchases - as an active participant in stakeholder in the community, I contribute to the governance of the communit…
Only the home improvements is unique to home ownership, the rest happen whether or not you're renting or owning.
Even improvements aren't unique; the last time I moved into an apartment I replaced the wall-to-wall carpet with pine boards, replaced the 50+ year old electric receptacles with GFCI outlets and stripped off the old paint and put on a new coat of primer and paint.
Re: Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent
#246It seems to me a huge problem when they retire?
If you run out of money, the state pays for your housing. If you saved money like a good citizen, you're paying out of your own pocket.
Re: Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent
#247Being German I want to pPoint out that the article leaves out one cruicial detail: Building your own home puts you into debt for quite literally the rest of your life. We do not like debt.
Pretty much agreed. My rather simple (and completely argumentative) explanation is that Germans generally are less enthusiastic about taking on debt to finance things. Psychologically I'd say it's rooted in the fact that the results of hyperinflation are very much in the minds of people and there's a tendency of "don't borrow if you can save for it". Since the only realistic option for buying houses is taking on debt…
It's not about inflation, since inflation is actually good for you if you're in debt (as your debt is not adjusted to the inflation, your debt is effectively shrinking by the inflation).
People are still buying and building houses here, especial in rural areas. It's mostly the cities where things simply have become unaffordable for most people.
Re: Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent
#248Earlier quoted context omitted.
>My US Bank clerk needed a few meetings to convince me that it is good to build go into monthly credits (creditcard) to support my credit score. Uhmm, can't a bank see your salaries? Because in Turkey they want to see your salaries. You enter to www.turkiye.gov.tr and print out your last 12 months salaries with a validation number and then hand it to your bank. Or you ask from your employer, he ask it from Social Sec…
The US system is kind of broken. They don't equate high salary with high creditworthiness - maybe it's because of the american culture of consumerism (which implies that you might make lots of money, but if you spend it all and are going into debt to fund your lavish lifestyle, then you're not creditworthy). So the American system rates creditworthiness by a history of paying off debt on time (usually credit cards, m…
Right. Their models are "trained" on people who have credit card debt. No history of using a credit card? "Ugh, weirdo, don't bother, send them to subprime."
Happened to me too -- I was working at my first job for 18 months but had never gotten a credit card. I had never had debts and was asking for a mortgage less than 2x my salary while making 3x the median income for the area and at its largest employer; still classified as subprime.
What's worse is that I could go to the annual credit report services and get my score, which would show it as 740, but then any actual lender I went to wouldn't see the 740; they'd see "no data", which puts you in the subprime bucket.
I would be auto-rejected even for $500-limit store credit cards.
(It's been since resolved and I've had a credit card for a while but still, very screwy.)
Re: Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent
#249Earlier quoted context omitted.
Using credit cards does not preclude being able to afford the thing you are paying for. I regularly use my credit card for every day purchases despite having ample money in my checking account. The regular payments allow me to develop a good credit history without much worry.
Why can't you use a debit card for that? Isn't having enough money in your checking account to reasonably afford all stuff you need to live basically proof of a good credit history? Isn't the best credit history one where you never need credit in the first place?
"Best" for what, exactly? The only use for a credit history is getting credit, and having none means you're a risky person to lend to.
Re: Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent
#250Earlier quoted context omitted.
Bingo. Unfortunately the common assumption is that you're not paying it off monthly and paying high interest.
Which, by the way, sounds like an awful concept of how creditworthiness is created. Signing into some unnecessary additional financial product with comically obsolete interest rates, just to manually repay it in the random timeframe in which the (still unnecessary) credit is free sounds like a bad idea. It's probably only there to nudge people into paying interest on money they already have.
> the random timeframe in which the (still unnecessary) credit is free
Are you talking about the 0% APR period, or the monthly revolving cycle? The latter is absolutely predictable, and if you dislike manual payments you can always set up automatic ones.