Heating exposure: 31% increase meets households across the country!

Heating exposure: 31% increase meets households across the country!

The heating costs in two- and multi-family houses recorded a shocking increase of over 31 percent last year! According to the new warming monitor of the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW), households felt the financial consequences of the energy crisis, which was triggered by the Ukraine conflict. This increase is almost as drastic as the increase in prices in the first year of the war when energy costs rose by more than 33 percent.

The study, which analyzed heating accounts of around 170,000 buildings, shows that households paid an average of 11.81 cents per kilowatt hour, also taking into account the gas price lid. This increase is a serious financial problem for many rental apartments, since the increasing costs for gas, oil and district heating are increasingly difficult to bear. The examination extends over more than 1.5 million apartments created by the real estate service provider ISTA.

Energy consumption on the retreat

On the positive side, the energy requirements of the apartments in 2023 experienced a decline. The temperature -adjusted consumption fell to an average of 118 kilowatt hours per square meter, which means a decrease of 3.8 percent compared to the previous year and even 8.9 percent since 2021. The authors of the study attribute this decline to the increased prices, energy saving calls and technical efficiency measures. But be careful! The savings cannot compensate for the dramatic price increase.

regional differences are also striking: households in eastern Germany, from Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania to Bavaria, require significantly less heating energy compared to West Germany. While East German households consume only 111 kilowatt hours per square meter, it is 121 kilowatt hours in the West. The highest consumption was found in Saarland with 137 kilowatt hours, while in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania with only 99 kilowatt hours were heated most economically.