BERLIN, April 18 (Xinhua) -- The housing crisis in Europe's largest economy continues to worsen due to rising interest rates and high material costs, with the number of building permits falling for the tenth month in a row.
Only 22,300 new homes were approved in February, more than 20 percent less than in the same month last year, the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) said on Tuesday.
The figures are "truly gloomy omens for much-needed housing construction in this country," said Felix Pakleppa, chief executive of the Central Association of the German Construction Industry (ZDB). The German construction industry is facing a "downward spiral," he warned.
According to the real estate industry's spring report, Germany's shortage of homes will grow to 400,000 in 2023, and could reach as much as 700,000 by the middle of the decade.
"If we continue as we are, we will not be able to avert a housing debacle in 2025," the chairman of the Central Real Estate Committee (ZIA) warned when presenting the report in February.
Germany again missed its annual target of 400,000 new homes in 2022, and the government does not expect to reach it this year either. The goal must be to "get close to this figure in 2024 and 2025 through prefabrication and digitization," said Minister of Construction Klara Geywitz at the beginning of the year.
Due to Germany's aging population, an increasing number of senior-friendly apartments are required. There is already a shortage of 2.2 million such homes, according to a study published by the German Building Materials Trade Association (BDB) on Monday.
To address this issue, particularly in larger cities, the Left Party has proposed enabling apartment swaps between seniors and young families in tenancy law. "The impending housing shortage for seniors is alarming and shameful for a rich country," said Left Party housing expert Caren Lay on Monday. ■