FDP on housing

The FDP wants state planning to allow more housing and to lift fixed growth limits for rural municipalities. Municipalities should find it easier to designate commercial and mixed-use zones, and the state should invest in rural infrastructure and digitalization. According to the platform, this would ease pressure on urban housing markets.

The FDP wants more homes in the countryside. Villages should be allowed to grow more. Towns should find it easier to set aside land for businesses. The state should invest in internet and transport there. This should take pressure off the cities.

The platform argues that new rural housing lowers pressure on rents and land prices in the cities. The FDP keeps the principle of building inside existing settlements first, in order to limit land use and infrastructure costs. Municipalities should get more leeway to designate commercial zones so that tax revenue from new businesses covers the cost of daycare and schools for a growing population. Mixed-use zones, where people can live where they work, should be easier to designate. Broadband and good transport links are meant to make rural areas more attractive places to live.

The FDP wants to keep funding social housing through state grants. Eligibility for a subsidized apartment would be reviewed every 24 months, and Wohngeld (housing benefit) would be adjusted regularly in line with rents.

The state should keep paying for low-cost homes. Every two years, officials should check whether tenants still qualify. Housing benefit should rise along with rents. Housing benefit is money from the state to help pay rent.

According to the platform, low-interest loans have lost their appeal because interest rates are low, so funding through grants should stay. Projects should have a social mix of residents. People whose finances improve should not have to move out, but in the FDP's view should no longer live at a subsidized rate. Eligibility certificates would therefore no longer be valid indefinitely for the whole tenancy. The party sees regionally graded housing benefit as targeted help for those in need.

The FDP wants municipalities to designate enough building land and to process building applications quickly and with little red tape. Better conditions for private builders should take priority over founding new municipal housing companies.

Towns should provide enough land for building. They should handle building applications quickly. The FDP mainly wants to support private builders. It sees new town-owned housing companies as less useful.

According to the platform, Schleswig-Holstein does not lack investors but good conditions for private construction. Fast permits are meant to lower building costs. In the FDP's view, private companies use their capital more efficiently than the state; it cites the experience with HSH Nordbank as evidence. Municipalities should not lightly take on the risk of losses that comes with running a business.

The FDP rejects the Mietpreisbremse (rent brake), caps on rent increases and a ban on converting rental apartments into owner-occupied ones. It sees them as disproportionate interference with property rights and freedom of contract that prevents investment in new housing.

The FDP is against fixed limits on rents. It says such rules scare off builders. Then fewer new homes get built. Landlords should also be allowed to sell their apartments.

According to the platform, these tools do not address the causes of high rents but make things worse because investors turn to other assets. The FDP cites developments in Berlin as an example. It stresses that two out of three apartments in the state are rented out by private landlords, who carry most of the housing supply. For that reason, a landlord must be able to sell their property. Building more and more cheaply is, in its view, the right answer to higher prices.

The FDP calls for all new and existing laws to be checked for their effect on housing costs. New laws that affect housing should only be passed after such a check.

The FDP wants a "Mieten-TÜV" (rent check). It is a test for laws. It shows whether a law makes housing more expensive. A law should only be passed after this test.

The check is meant to show how much a law affects rents, utility costs, construction costs or permit procedures. The body that passes the law would organize and pay for it. The platform argues that higher energy requirements and building standards make construction, and therefore housing, more expensive. Building standards themselves would also be reviewed.