Bremen is fighting for rent controls: Final decision is pending!

Bremen is fighting for rent controls: Final decision is pending!

On December 20, 2024, Bremen submitted a new application to the Federal Council Extension of the rent control and to adjust the debt brake. Bremen's Finance Senator Björn Fecker (Greens) is calling for the federal states to be given more scope for new debt in order to enable necessary investments in ailing infrastructure such as bridges, schools and port facilities. The spokesman for the Bremen finance department emphasized that regular budgets cannot currently afford this. Lower Saxony and Saarland were originally supposed to support the initiative, but withdrew in view of the upcoming federal election.

In addition, Bremen, together with other federal states such as Hamburg, Lower Saxony and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, is committed to continuing the rent cap until the end of 2029. How Federal Minister of Justice Dr. Volker Wissing explained, an extension is crucial to protect tenants from excessive rent increases. Since its introduction in 2015, the rent cap is intended to slow the increase in residential rents in metropolitan-sensitive regions, but without this regulation there is a risk of significant rent increases in the coming years. Innovations in the draft law aim to extend the validity of the regulations until 2029 and also include apartments that were rented for the first time between 2014 and 2019 in the scope of application.

The rent control applies in areas with a tight housing market and allows state governments to determine by legal regulation which areas are affected. If there is no timely legal adjustment, the regulations would expire at the end of 2025. The government plans to strengthen the rights of the states in order to be able to react better to rental price developments. A positive step towards stable rental prices in a tense market situation, but it is only part of the solution to the housing shortage.