SPD on housing

The SPD wants to subsidize the construction of homes with affordable rents and apply the Mietpreisbremse (rent brake) in urban centers. Families are to get help buying a home, and 1,000 dorm places are planned for apprentices and students.

Housing should stay affordable. The SPD wants to support building cheap homes. In popular places, the rent brake should apply. It limits how high a new rent can be. Young people should get 1,000 places in dorms.

The platform focuses on people of all generations with low and middle incomes. The rent brake is meant to keep rents stable in centers, including tourist ones. Families are to receive reduced-interest loans for home ownership through the planned development bank. The 1,000 dorm places for apprentices and students can be newly built or renovated and are meant to secure cheap housing for young people.

The SPD wants new hotel projects to be linked to housing for tourism workers. To that end, the state is to lobby the federal government for corresponding rules in building law. Tourism should develop in a way that gives equal weight to locals' interests in affordable housing and quality of life.

Tourist towns often lack affordable homes. Whoever builds a hotel should also build homes for the workers. The SPD wants new federal rules for this. The wishes of locals should count as much as those of guests.

The state is to press the federal government for building-law options that allow hotel projects only in combination with housing for people working in the sector. The SPD also wants to promote this link with municipalities. The concerns of visitors and residents are to be considered in all local projects. The program argues that a destination is only attractive if the local population welcomes its guests.

The SPD wants to keep the Mietpreisbremse (rent brake) in Rostock, Greifswald and several tourist towns until housing markets there ease. In heavily strained tourist regions, local bylaws against misuse of housing are to keep limiting the conversion of homes into vacation rentals.

In some places, homes are scarce and costly. A rent brake applies there. It limits the rent in new leases. The SPD wants to keep it. Fewer homes should become vacation rentals.

The rent brake is to apply as long as markets in the affected places remain tight. Bylaws against misuse are meant to secure housing for local residents and curb conversion into vacation rentals. The SPD treats housing as part of basic public services and distinguishes between tight markets in cities and tourist regions and rural areas, where the issues are vacancy and suitable forms of housing.

The SPD wants to further develop funding for housing aimed at young people, using federal money. The focus is on building new dorms and expanding existing ones for apprentices and students.

Young people need affordable rooms. The SPD wants more dorms for apprentices and students. The state will use federal money for this. Getting the funding should be simple.

The funding is to stay within the programs provided by the federal government. It is to be designed to be as targeted as possible and with little red tape. The main aim is to support new construction and expansion of dorms.

The SPD relies on social housing and mixed neighborhoods to prevent displacement. Municipalities are to get support in buying land to hold in reserve, and modular and serial construction is to receive more funding.

The SPD wants more social housing. Poorer and richer people should live in the same neighborhood. Towns should buy land and keep it for housing. Homes made from ready-made parts should get more funding.

Municipal and cooperative housing companies are to be able to operate economically and access funding without unnecessary hurdles. On land, the SPD's principle is that the common good comes before speculation. The platform sees modular and serial construction as a path to faster and cheaper housing. The state's funding programs for new construction and modernization and the effects of the simplified state building code are to be reviewed continuously and adjusted where needed. The SPD wants to pay special attention to large housing estates.

The SPD wants to keep funding the construction and renovation of affordable, accessible homes in rural areas too. This is meant to let older people stay in familiar surroundings; energy retrofits are to remain affordable.

Rural areas should have suitable homes too. Older people need homes without steps or barriers. The SPD wants to fund such homes. That way, older people can stay in their village.

Funding is to cover not only larger and mid-sized centers but also rural places with working infrastructure, such as a doctor, a school, shops and public transit. Funding for new construction in non-central places remains possible case by case if medical care and everyday goods are available nearby. The state programs for accessible, age-appropriate and energy-efficient conversion are to apply statewide. The SPD wants to handle energy retrofits "with a sense of proportion." Family-friendly neighborhoods with safe routes and places to play are also part of the goal.