German Housing Research Articles

A Study on the Application of Housing Benefits to North Korea after Unification Based on the Example of East German Housing Subsidies after the Unification in Germany

본 연구의 목적은 통일 이후 남한의 공공부조형 주거급여제도를 북한에 적용하는 제도이식의 관점에 기초하여 북한지역 주거급여제도를 설계하는 것이다. 이를 위해 통독 이후 동독에 적용하였던 주거보조금 제도를 역사적으로 고찰하고, 한반도 통일 이후 북한에 적용할 공공부조형 주거급여 적용방안을 제시하였다. 본 연구를 통한 주요 결론은 다음과 같다. 첫째, 독일의 경험과 마찬가지로 급진적 주거정책 통합이 아닌 장기적 관점에서 점진적 주거정책 통합 방안이 요청된다. 둘째, 통일독일의 동독 주거보조금 사례를 볼 때, 주택사유화 과정에서 필연적으로 발생할 주거취약계층을 위한 공공부조형 주거급여 제도가 요청된다. 셋째, 인구이동 최소화를 목표로 실행한다면, 통일 초기 한시적으로 북한 거주 북한주민과 남한 이주 북한주민에 대한 차등적 주거급여를 고려 할 수 있다. 마지막으로 통일 이후 발생할 주거문제에 적절히 대응하기 위하여 통일인지적(unification-perspectives) 관점에서의 학술적, 정책적, 실천적 과제를 제시하였다.

An expectancy theory approach: What motivates and differentiates German house owners in the context of energy efficient refurbishment measures?

Due to the multiple benefits associated with energy efficient refurbishment measures in the building sector, it is important to identify the factors which influence house owners’ behavior in this context in order to raise the refurbishment rate. Based on a Germany-wide online survey, we investigated the factors which influence owner-occupiers of single and two family houses that are 50 years or older. This was done utilizing Vroom’s Expectancy Theory. We compared house owners who stated an intention to undertake energy efficient refurbishment measures, house owners who stated a need for such measures but no intention, and house owners who had already completed refurbishment measures. Using multinomial logistic regression analysis, we identified the role of indoor comfort as being a motivational trigger. We also identified hindering aspects such as finances, time constraints and the house owners’ own capabilities to undertake the refurbishment measures. Moreover, this study provides information on both planned and already conducted refurbishment measures as well as those parts of houses where survey participants perceive a need for energy-related refurbishment measures. Based on our findings we suggest that practically orientated measures should be implemented to increase the energy efficiency of older houses, e.g. presenting best practice refurbishment projects.

The New Socialist Man in the Plattenbau: The East German Housing Program and the Development of the Socialist Way of Life

This article argues that the importance of housing and the urban environment in East Germany in the second half of its existence grew in tandem with a new vision of socialist society and the means that the state should employ to create it. The East German Housing Program, inaugurated in 1971, made space the primary category in which individual and social transformation was envisioned, replacing the pedagogical processes that had originally stood at its heart. In doing so, architects and urban planners drew on three strands of urban planning that have often been seen in conflict in other contexts: the Soviet concept of the Mikroraion or socialist neighborhood, the modernist housing ensemble of Le Corbusier, and the new urbanism of Jane Jacobs.

The alternative financialization of the German housing market

While many European countries experienced a global housing boom in the early/mid-2000s, house prices and mortgage debt in Germany stagnated. Therefore, the German housing system is considered to be operating outside financialized capitalism. Despite Germany’s apparent stability, we argue that an alternative trajectory of financialization in the German housing market can be observed. This trajectory has followed three stages or ‘waves’. The first wave started around the time of German unification and is characterized by the failed attempt of West German banks to marketize and liberalize German housing finance. The second wave started in the late 1990s and is characterized by the ‘financialized privatization’ of many public housing associations and the speculative investments of private equity firms and hedge funds. The third wave started during the global financial crisis and is characterized by booming housing prices and the market entry of listed real estate companies.

Nuclear power plant closures and local housing values: Evidence from Fukushima and the German housing market

The Fukushima Daiichi accident in Japan in March 2011 caused a fundamental change in Germany’s energy policy which led to the immediate shut down of nearly half of its nuclear power plants. Using data from Germany’s largest internet platform for real estate and employing a difference-in-differences approach, we find that Fukushima reduced housing prices near nuclear power plants that were in operation before Fukushima by 4.9%. Housing prices near sites that were shut down right after the accident even fell by 9.8%. Our results suggest that on the German housing market, the negative economic effects of the closure of nuclear power plants dominate potential positive changes in local amenities.

Analysing sustainability certification systems in the German housing sector from a theory of social institutions

Sustainable residential buildings and a sustainable housing development (‘sustainable housing’) are key factors in the sustainability strategy of the German government. Certification systems have been developed to assess sustainable housing and to better inform stakeholders and hence improve sustainability in the housing sector. Currently, however, a variety of different certification systems exists to assess sustainable housing using different sets of indicators. The supply of different certification systems to measure the same (‘sustainability’) raises questions of validity of the assessment instruments. Also, different stakeholders hold different interests with regard to sustainability certification systems, which leads to investigate the legitimacy of certification systems. In this study, we applied the theory of social institutions to investigate legitimacy of sustainability certification in the housing sector. To find out about the validity of sustainability measurement, this article presents a survey where real estate stakeholders were asked to evaluate indicators applied by different sustainability certification systems. Results showed high heterogeneity of tastes towards indicators of sustainable housing. Results also identified potential ‘areas of conflicts’ where stakeholders differed most widely in the evaluation of indicators.

Contexts and conditions of ethnic discrimination: Evidence from a field experiment in a German housing market

People's housing conditions and places of residence have serious impacts on individual well-being and social stratification. This article focuses on different forms of ethnic discrimination in the rental housing market. Several hypotheses on statistical discrimination, spatial steering, and discrimination by price were tested by a field experiment in Germany that was unique regarding both the amount of information available on rental units and on ethnic composition of neighborhoods. For 637 rental objects, two e-mail inquiries were sent out with applicants having German or Turkish names and varying occupations. Logistic random intercept regressions revealed a discrimination rate against Turkish applicants of 9 percentage points. Indicating a high occupational status in the application reduced this discrimination rate significantly, but private landlords tended to disregard status and discriminate by migration background only. Surprisingly, the discrimination against Turkish applicants was the strongest when the proportion of Turkish residents living in the neighborhood was highest. German applicants were particularly favored over Turks when making applications for reasonably priced objects. These results point to both core mechanisms driving discrimination (preference and information) being relevant, but in different market segments.

The Power of Mandatory Quality Disclosure: Evidence from the German Housing Market

The Power of Mandatory Quality Disclosure: Evidence from the German Housing Market

A Consumer Decision-Making Process? Unfolding Energy Efficiency Decisions of German Owner-Occupiers

The German housing stock needs substantial energetic retrofit to meet carbon reduction targets. Various instruments are available to motivate building owners to improve the energy efficiency of their dwellings. These instruments mainly focus on the economic issue of funding and financing energy efficient refurbishments as the decision is interpreted as a rational choice of an investment. Their success is rather low as the refurbishment rate stagnates around 1% per year for more than a decade. The objective of this study is to gain deeper insights into the decision-making of owner-occupiers regarding energy efficient refurbishments and to offer an adjusted framework to analyse the decision. A qualitative-explorative research approach is chosen, whereby in-depth interviews with independent energy advisers have been conducted. Results point out that the decision of owner-occupiers towards energy efficient refurbishment measures qualifies as an extensive consumer decision rather than a pure investment decision. The refurbishment measure implies high cognitive as well as emotional involvement. Owner-occupiers use several criteria to evaluate refurbishments, which alleviate monetary determinants. The standard process model of consumer decision-making, reaching from need recognition to post-purchase evaluation, qualifies for structuring the decision. It allows analysing drivers and barriers stepwise and deriving implications for activating homeowners and for promoting energy efficiency in each step. Current policies partly choose unrewarding argumentations to stimulate energy efficient refurbishments since they do not take all relevant factors of this consumer decision into account.

Specialised Financial Intermediaries and the Impact of Savings and Loan Contracts on Real Estate Finance

The significant macroeconomic importance of housing market stability has been prominently highlighted in the context of the 2008 US sub-prime mortgage financial crisis. Evaluating the aftermath of this global economic crisis, the notorious stability of German housing markets in comparison to other industrialised nations is a particularly interesting case for empirical investigation. An idiosyncratic and yet vital institutional characteristic of German housing financing markets, regularly neglected in the academic literature, are building and loan associations (“Bausparkassen”). These institutions constitute a special case of financial intermediaries because they exclusively sell the rather unique mortgage financing instrument of savings and loan contracts (SLCs). Based on an overlapping-generation model, these contracts give their holders the option to take out a housing loan in the future at an interest rate fixed on the date of conclusion of contract.In this paper, we empirically examine whether this mortgage financing instrument creates the anti-cyclic incentive mechanisms that its peculiar option-like structure would theoretically suggest. More specifically, we investigate whether SLC contract holders indeed have a higher propensity to borrow under increasing interest rate regimes, thereby supposedly serving as an important stabiliser of housing market liquidity in crunching environments. Controlling for important macroeconomic covariates, we show that both SLC savings deposits and SLC loans taken by households precisely reflect this counter cyclicality to interest rate changes. These findings thus broadly corroborate SLCs as an important specificity of German mortgage financing contributing to the overall stability of corresponding housing markets.

Assessing house prices in Germany: evidence from a regional data set

Purpose With a view to the unconventional monetary policy measures implemented in the euro area in recent years, this study aims to investigate whether the recent house price increases in Germany are signals of an incipient overheating of the German housing market. Design/methodology/approach This paper presents a valuation measure for residential property based on a large and exhaustive regional panel data set for Germany. The fitted house prices from a panel regression at the district level, taking into account spatial spillovers, are taken as a measure of the fundamental equilibrium house prices, which can be aggregated for various regional subsets. Findings The estimation results suggest that apartment prices over the past years substantially exceeded the fundamental price suggested by the model, in particular in the big cities. Single-family houses appear to be markedly overvalued mainly in the cities. The low level of interest rates in recent years appears to have contributed to the emergence of misalignments. Originality/value Exploiting the variation across local housing markets, the estimation approach provides value-add for the estimation of house price valuation results in various regional subsets, as conventional time-series approaches to valuing property are subject to severe data limitations in the case of Germany.

Are Energy Efficiency Ratings Ignored in the German Housing Market? Evidence from a Large-Sample Hedonic Study

Improving the energy efficiency levels of housing is of particular concern in the private rental market where capital costs and subsequent utility cost savings are not shared in equal measure by landlords and tenants. This problem is particularly pronounced in Germany where rental properties make up the majority of the housing stock. The present study is the largest and most comprehensive study of the value of energy efficiency in the German housing market and investigates the effect of energy efficiency ratings on rental values across 412 markets in Germany. Using a semiparametric hedonic model and an empirical sample of nearly 500k observations with full hedonic characteristics, we find strong evidence that energy-efficient rental units are rented at a premium. A survival hazard model is then used to study the impact of the ratings on time-on-market. It is found that energy-efficient rental properties tend to lease up more quickly than their non-efficient peers. This study provides a very robust framework for policy makers and property companies for understanding how energy efficiency and expected utility costs of a rental property affect asking and effective rents.

The Power of Mandatory Quality Disclosure: Evidence from the German Housing Market

AbstractNumerous countries have introduced energy performance certificates to mitigate the information asymmetry with respect to the thermal quality of houses. Motivated by a stylized theoretical m...

Sense Distortions in the Mass Media: Their Social Consequences

The paper presents the results of the monitoring of St. Petersburg newspapers held in January-May 2015. The monitoring included qualitative and quantitative study of the content and evaluation of all the materials published in St. Petersburg newspapers. Special attention was given to such sections as Society, Politics, Law, Economy. The purpose of monitoring regional press was to detect errors or misstatements in the media sources, including online media. Semantic distortion was found in 204 publications. Violations of journalism ethics give rise to the problem of information distortion and, as a consequence, useless, poor-quality information deforms the reality communicated to the audience. Systematizing the violations of ethical principles of journalism give a clear picture of the present-day Russian mass media and open up the ways to improve self-regulatory mechanisms. The study reported here is unique as it is the first research focusing on ethical violations in Russian mass media. The results of the study are used as case studies to analyze ethical conflicts, as materials to promote professional standards for journalists investigating corruption schemes, etc. The monitoring data is included in the study that will be discussed at the permanent international seminar on the ethics of journalism Ethics of Mass Communication: Research in Russia and abroad. The first seminar was held on October 3-4, 2013 at the High School of Journalism and Mass Communications, St. Petersburg State University, with the support of the German House of Research and Innovation in Moscow and the Consulate General of Germany in St. Petersburg.

Taking the Pulse of the German Housing Market

In seiner jungeren Geschichte war Deutschland mit vielen tiefgreifenden okonomischen Krisen konfrontiert. Diese wirkten sich vollkommen unterschiedlich auf den Wohnimmobilienmarkt aus. Einige Krisen machten sich auf nationaler, andere hingegen lediglich auf regionaler Ebene bemerkbar. Manche Krisen wiederum gingen scheinbar spurlos am deutschen Wohnimmobilienmarkt vorbei.

1920·30년대 독일 공동주택 발코니부의 구성방식에 관한 고찰 - 파사드 배열방식 및 재료 구성방식을 중심으로 -

The purpose of this study was to analyze the arrangement and the material organisation of the balcony and its surrounding on the facade of german multi-family housing from the 1920s to 1930s to clarify the characteristics of the balcony and its surrounding regarding its relationship with the modern balcony. In this study the balcony was assorted into three basic elements as the balcony railing, the solar shading device and the plantation. The results of this study were as follows; the arrangement of the balcony railing on the housing facade could be categorized into the main one type which was the vertical row-arrangement. The main materials used for the balcony railing were the brick, the white and polychrome stucco and the iron. The balcony railing made from the brick and the stucco had the characteristic of a closed railing while it from the iron had the same of a open railing. As the solar shading device like the simple ownings, curtains and parasols installed limitedly by the inhabitant themselves, the horizontal iron bar are installed on the upper part of the center of the brick and stucco railings for the plant-boxes.

An Analytical Study of Building Materials and Deterioration Factors of Farasan Heritage Houses, and the Recommendations of Conservation and Rehabilitation (German House Case Study)

Heritage Houses in Farasan Islands are facing several threats that may cause their destruction. The houses have been affected by both the richness and poorness of their building materials. This study is concerned with the deterioration factors which affect the heritage houses in Farasan Islands. Modern techniques will be used in investigating, analyzing and documenting the cultural heritage. The study will propose an integral and applicable plan for the restoration, conservation and rehabilitation of heritage houses in Farasan Islands.

The Housing Market, Household Portfolios and the German Consumer

House price booms in Anglo-Saxon economies and their collapse were an important part of the financial accelerator via consumption, construction and the banking system. This paper examines links for Germany between household portfolios, income and consumption in a six-equation system, for 1980-2012 data, for consumption, house prices, consumer credit, housing loans, liquid assets and permanent income with latent variables representing the shifts in the availability of the two types of credit. We find evidence of well specified consumption and house price functions and that Germany differs greatly from the Anglo-Saxon economies: rising house prices do not translate into higher consumer spending. This suggests that the transmission of monetary policy via asset prices, in particular house prices, on consumption is likely to be less effective, and any financial accelerator weaker, in Germany than in the US or the UK. There is little evidence of overvaluation of German house prices by 2012. JEL Classification: E21, E27, E44, E51, E58

The Effects of Multiple Stigmas on Discrimination in the German Housing Market

Abstract. In two online field-experiments (N1 = 336, N2 = 456) we investigated the effects of belonging to an ethnic minority, a sexual minority, or to both minority groups simultaneously on rental discrimination in Germany. We predicted that a Turkish heterosexual couple and a German gay male couple would receive fewer replies to their inquiries about a rental offering and fewer invitations for viewings than a German heterosexual couple. We also predicted that the intersection of two stigmatized identities would have beneficial effects and thus result in less discrimination of the Turkish gay male couple compared to the Turkish heterosexual couple. Chi-square tests revealed evidence of rental discrimination based on ethnicity, but not for discrimination based on sexual orientation; no evidence for beneficial effects of the intersection of two stigmatized identities was found. Implications for future research on discrimination of ethnic and sexual minorities are discussed.

What motivates young physicians? - a qualitative analysis of the learning climate in specialist medical training.

BackgroundNot least the much-invoked shortage of physicians in the current and the next generation has resulted in a wide range of efforts to improve postgraduate medical training. This is also in the focus of the current healthcare policy debate. Furthermore, quality and scope of available postgraduate training are important locational advantages in the competition for medical doctors. This study investigates the preferences and concerns that German house officers (HOs) have about their current postgraduate training. It also highlights how HOs evaluate the quality of their current postgraduate training and the learning environment.MethodsHOs were asked to answer the question: “Which things are of capital importance to you personally in your medical training?”, using a free text format. The survey was conducted web based (Lime survey) and all data was anonymized. Summarizing qualitative analyses were performed using the software tool MaxQDA.ResultsA total of 255 HOs participated in this study (female: n = 129/50.6 %; male: n = 126/49.4 %; age: 32 + 6 years) associated with 17 different German hospitals and from four medical specialties. Ten categories were generated from a total of 366 free text answers: 1. methodology of learning (n = 66), 2. supervision (n = 66), 3. learning structure (n = 61), 4. teaching competence (n = 37), 5. dedication (n = 34), 6. work climate (n = 29), 7. feedback/communication (n = 22), 8. challenge/patient safety (n = 21), 9. time/resources (n = 17), 10. personal security/safety (n = 13).ConclusionsHOs want a reliable and curriculum-guided learning structure. Different studying techniques should be used with sufficient (time) resources available in a trusting and communicative learning environment. Competent and dedicated instructors are expected to give individual and specific feedback to the HOs on individual strengths and deficits. Instructors should develop educational concepts in cooperation with the HOs and at the same time avoid excessive demands on HOs or hazards to patients.