Hello dear homebuilding community,
I would like to start with a brief introduction.
My girlfriend (30) and I (29) currently live with our two small children (2 years and 7 months) in a lovely three-room apartment in Berlin.
We are both employed full-time (she as a special education teacher, I as a chemist), and a few weeks ago we made the final decision to build or buy a small but nice house (already our first question).
The rent for a four-room apartment that we would like here in northern Berlin (Pankow/Weißensee) is at least 1500€ cold rent. After some back and forth, it became clear that we don’t want to go down that path and instead want to get something of our own.
Our dream is to find something in the northernmost parts of Berlin (Karow, Buch, etc.): 5 rooms, 2 bathrooms, at least 110m² (1184 sq ft) of living space, and a small but nice garden in the back where the kids can play, splash around, and climb. And where the parents can sunbathe and, as typically German as it sounds, of course grill.
Unfortunately, we have no point of contact at all—neither among friends nor family—who owns a home and can help us with initial questions. So, this is my attempt to get some input from you here.
We have already had a conversation with a financial advisor. The gist is that with our current salary situation, we could finance a house costing about 550,000€ (including property transfer tax, notary fees, etc., the total would be around 650,000€). Browsing well-known portals like immonet, ImmobilienScout, etc., it is already difficult to find something decent within that budget. What other options are there for acquiring existing properties? I assume that the listings that have been on immonet for a while are not the best ones...
There are also several offers for planned properties. My question here is whether someone could roughly estimate what additional costs come up before a property is finally ready to move in.
I know it’s impossible to give exact numbers, but maybe someone could take a quick look and roughly calculate what extra costs on top of the purchase price to expect.
Feel free to share your opinions on prefab houses as well. Since we have no experience with construction projects and no friends or family who know their way around, building ourselves is out of the question.
So the only option is either a prefab house or an existing property.
I hope you can help me a bit.
Thanks and best regards
I would like to start with a brief introduction.
My girlfriend (30) and I (29) currently live with our two small children (2 years and 7 months) in a lovely three-room apartment in Berlin.
We are both employed full-time (she as a special education teacher, I as a chemist), and a few weeks ago we made the final decision to build or buy a small but nice house (already our first question).
The rent for a four-room apartment that we would like here in northern Berlin (Pankow/Weißensee) is at least 1500€ cold rent. After some back and forth, it became clear that we don’t want to go down that path and instead want to get something of our own.
Our dream is to find something in the northernmost parts of Berlin (Karow, Buch, etc.): 5 rooms, 2 bathrooms, at least 110m² (1184 sq ft) of living space, and a small but nice garden in the back where the kids can play, splash around, and climb. And where the parents can sunbathe and, as typically German as it sounds, of course grill.
Unfortunately, we have no point of contact at all—neither among friends nor family—who owns a home and can help us with initial questions. So, this is my attempt to get some input from you here.
We have already had a conversation with a financial advisor. The gist is that with our current salary situation, we could finance a house costing about 550,000€ (including property transfer tax, notary fees, etc., the total would be around 650,000€). Browsing well-known portals like immonet, ImmobilienScout, etc., it is already difficult to find something decent within that budget. What other options are there for acquiring existing properties? I assume that the listings that have been on immonet for a while are not the best ones...
There are also several offers for planned properties. My question here is whether someone could roughly estimate what additional costs come up before a property is finally ready to move in.
I know it’s impossible to give exact numbers, but maybe someone could take a quick look and roughly calculate what extra costs on top of the purchase price to expect.
Feel free to share your opinions on prefab houses as well. Since we have no experience with construction projects and no friends or family who know their way around, building ourselves is out of the question.
So the only option is either a prefab house or an existing property.
I hope you can help me a bit.
Thanks and best regards
hausnrplus2525 Apr 2020 20:43vorkalmatador schrieb:
Unfortunately, we do not have any contact person, neither among friends nor family, who owns a home and can support us with initial questions. So now I’m trying here to get some input from you. Welcome!
You are definitely in the right place, and there are already many threads on this topic, but from the way your posts sound, you are still VERY much at the beginning in terms of your knowledge. That’s perfectly fine—everyone was there once (unless you already work professionally in the construction industry).
My only advice is to start by spending dozens of hours browsing and reading here (and also other parts of the World Wide Web, including YouTube), reading and listening as much as possible.
Good luck.
W
Worrier8425 Apr 2020 20:52hausnrplus25 schrieb:
I can only recommend spending dozens of hours first researching and reading here (and also other parts of the World Wide Web, including YouTube) — reading and listening extensively. Or you can use this time to further your professional education, thereby increasing your salary, and continue living comfortably as a renter.
vorkalmatador schrieb:
Developer project (?) Would this then be a kind of all-in package, meaning house and land?
[...] How do I find the mentioned developer projects? And what exactly are these? Developers are essentially commercial builders. They develop land by building a house on it and then sell the fully built property. It’s like a brand-new demonstration car, but in the form of a house.
Traditionally, the developer would build a house they expected to sell quickly based on experience, without having a specific buyer in mind. In recent years, this has increasingly changed: nowadays, the buyer is often found first, and construction only starts afterward. This allows the buyer to have more input, at least for detached houses or semi-detached houses. In the case of terraced houses (townhouses), the design options remain more limited, similar to what was common before—for example, choosing between an open-plan kitchen or one separated from the living room by a partition.
The advantage of the older approach was that the house was often already at least partly constructed, so buyers could physically visit it. Today, construction often hasn’t started yet, so you usually see only drawings or design concepts. However, today the design process is more detailed, and the buyer is more involved in planning. As a result, buyers tend to see themselves more as clients or builders, which sometimes leads to confusion in discussions about terms like "general contractor" (builds, possibly turnkey, usually on your land) and "developer" (always builds turnkey, on his own land).
Developer projects are easy to find because developers advertise them. Often, they are marketed similar to existing properties but can be identified by notes like "construction begins summer 2020." Unfortunately, many developer projects are also advertised as land plots, which you can only obtain by signing a building contract with the seller.
There is no shortage of developers of varying reputations in large cities and metropolitan areas. Although this is not a reliable rule, in my opinion, the better developers often work as general contractors as well. They frequently collaborate with regional banks, where their projects appear in real estate brochures. Developers are regularly involved in large area developments, such as when former military bases, industrial sites, or freight yard areas are repurposed. In principle, they are almost impossible to miss—you practically stumble across them everywhere. Watch for half-page illustrated ads in newspapers showing layouts of rows of terraced and semi-detached houses with lots of greenery and happy people.
https://www.instagram.com/11antgmxde/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/bauen-jetzt/
I recently completed a house renovation (3 years ago), and some friends are renovating their neighboring house.
What I’ve noticed (design is my profession) is that people often have certain criteria in mind that they believe are essential.
However, these are usually just what the neighbors have. If you free yourself from these “requirements,” you can save a lot of money.
You can also live very well with “less,” and not everything that is considered “normal” here in Germany is actually necessary.
What I’ve noticed (design is my profession) is that people often have certain criteria in mind that they believe are essential.
However, these are usually just what the neighbors have. If you free yourself from these “requirements,” you can save a lot of money.
You can also live very well with “less,” and not everything that is considered “normal” here in Germany is actually necessary.
manohara schrieb:
What I notice (design is my profession) is that people often have certain criteria in mind that they consider absolutely necessary. But these are usually just what the neighbors have. If you free yourself from these "requirements," you can save a lot of money.That's why the recipe for success in developer housing estates (just kidding!) is that the neighboring houses resemble each other like one pure white shoebox after another.https://www.instagram.com/11antgmxde/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/bauen-jetzt/
Similar topics