ᐅ New Standards in New Construction and Their Impact on Us

What kind of savings can be expected if you don’t build according to the building energy law?

I comply with the building energy law with 48 kWh/m²/a. Monolithic construction with 36.5cm (14.4 inches) aerated concrete insulation blocks, 8.5cm (3.3 inches) insulation with a thermal conductivity of 0.035 W/(m·K) on the floor slab, no insulation under or around the floor slab, triple-glazed windows, and 20cm (7.9 inches) mineral wool insulation with a thermal conductivity of 0.035 W/(m·K) between the ceiling and cold roof.

What meaningful savings could realistically be made here?

The truth is, building is mainly expensive because it needs to include things like:
a walk-in closet, a double garage, a guest room for guests who visit once a year, 250 power outlets, 30 network sockets, a server cabinet in the utility room, smart home system with KNX, bathroom fixtures from Villeroy & Boch, hardwood flooring glued down by a professional installer, painter quality level Q4, and so on.

You can see this here in the forum. Whoever builds a Town & Country house is portrayed as a social welfare recipient who should rather stay living in a block of flats...

But I live in my own home and will have paid it off in 20 to 25 years. While others complain they can’t afford a house, have to pay it off over 30 or 35 years, and spend 40% of their net income on it, well...

haydee schrieb:

The Energy Saving Ordinance is not to blame for the high prices.

But the original poster meant that as "new standards." Politicians don't care whether our houses are packed with walk-in closets or children's bathrooms.
I'll put it this way: as long as people can still afford all these things they don't really need in house construction, they shouldn't complain.

nordanney schrieb:

Currently, about 1.9 million apartments in various types of buildings are vacant (Census + Empirica). Overall, there is no general housing shortage. Of the mentioned vacancies, about one-third were ready to move into within the next three months.
But the apartments are not located where many people want to live. That is a much bigger problem.

Yes, that is absolutely true.

Now one wonders why refugees or welfare recipients have to live in Hamburg, Munich, or any other metropolitan area with a housing shortage at all?

Why doesn’t the government, which also pays for the rent of these apartments, manage the housing market? It cannot be that the police officer or the sales clerk in Munich cannot find housing while the welfare recipient’s rent is still being paid by the state.

It gives the impression that the government is even promoting the housing shortage.

Listings only online briefly

Rental madness in Berlin: 43,000 applicants for 288 apartments in 30 minutes.

These are the consequences. No sign of nearly 2 million vacant apartments.
I still remember the saying, “He who pays, calls the shots.” If the state is covering the rental costs, then it can and should also decide where the recipient should live. Then one wonders about clan formation and unwillingness to integrate.

But instead of Berlin, one could also live in Neuruppin or Dessau. In Dessau, even housing is being destroyed with government subsidies (demolition premiums). But that is just one of many problems in Germany.

It’s like with the bakery. Bread rolls got more expensive last year because grain prices soared. That was the explanation.
This year, grain prices have halved. Has any bakery lowered the prices for bread rolls? As far as I know, no.

Two years ago, they advertised building plots here. 50 Euro per sqm (square meter) (50 Euro per 10.8 sq ft), even in a nice location with a view, etc. Suddenly up to 75 Euro.
I wonder why? Because prices are rising everywhere. But nothing about the plot itself has changed. No measures influencing its value at all.

The main problem is much simpler, but also more unpleasant. There would be significantly more living space available—maybe not enough, but clearly more.
However, the existing living space is not used efficiently.

Often, elderly people live alone in apartments of 100m² (1,076 sq ft) or more, usually in old buildings. Their partner has passed away, and their family lives far away in other cities. This is not uncommon today.
But these elderly individuals cannot move because they cannot find a smaller apartment nearby with affordable rent.
So, one person, often completely overwhelmed, lives in 100m², at best only using the living room and bedroom.

This issue needs to be addressed, however that may be possible. It’s open for discussion.

But it doesn’t make sense to keep creating more and larger living spaces.
When I was apartment hunting nine years ago with my then-girlfriend because our first child was on the way, the typical new apartment looked like this:
80m² (860 sq ft) with two rooms—usually a bedroom and a living room. 100m² (1,076 sq ft) with three rooms. Four-room apartments only started at 120m² (1,292 sq ft). Crazy, completely crazy. Huge living rooms, huge balconies... nice, but unaffordable for the average person.

Back in the 1990s, I lived with my parents in a 100m² (1,076 sq ft), five-room apartment. No one builds apartments like that anymore...

MachsSelbst schrieb:

The main problem is much simpler, but also much more unpleasant. There would be clearly more living space, maybe not enough, but definitely more.
However, the existing living space is not used efficiently.

Often, elderly people live alone in old buildings with around 100m² (1,076 sq ft) or more. Their partner has passed away, and their family lives far away in other cities. This is now a very common situation.
But the elderly person cannot move because there is no smaller apartment nearby with affordable rent.
So one person, usually overwhelmed, lives alone in 100m² (1,076 sq ft), using at best only the living room and bedroom.

This issue needs to be addressed, however that might be done. It’s worth discussing.

But it doesn’t make sense to keep creating more and more, bigger and bigger living spaces.
When I was looking for an apartment 9 years ago with my then-girlfriend because our first child was on the way, the typical new-build apartment looked like this:
80m² (860 sq ft) with 2 rooms, meaning bedroom and living room; 100m² (1,076 sq ft) with 3 rooms; and 4 rooms only started at 120m² (1,292 sq ft). Madness, complete madness. Huge living rooms, huge balconies... nice, but unaffordable for the average person.

Back in the 90s, I lived with my parents in 100m² (1,076 sq ft) with 5 rooms. Nobody builds like that anymore...

I see the same gigantism in new construction. When we looked (just two of us, no children), there was hardly any existing single-family house that wasn’t too large. We now have 117m² (1,259 sq ft), which already includes the basement/utility room. It’s a 4.5-room layout, but one room is basically unused. And this is with a permanent home office. Currently, the garden feels too small, but definitely not the living space.

Layout, sensible room division, and room positioning are much more important than just size.

MachsSelbst schrieb:

huge balconies

See my view on gardens. With an apartment, I would definitely prioritize outdoor space, such as a “huge” rooftop terrace, over having larger rooms inside.

Exactly. When interest rates were high, semi-detached houses/townhouses were built. I deliberately mention the term "boklok." Also in terms of size. Boklok has nowadays reached around 120 square meters (1,290 square feet), almost 30% more. As interest rates fell, detached single-family homes became the norm, and from then on there was no stopping. 160, 180, 200 square meters (1,720, 1,940, 2,150 square feet), as long as it was big, bigger, biggest. Then the already mentioned guest bathrooms, master bathrooms, children’s bathrooms, wellness areas. Of course, all built to the minimum energy standard, insulation mania (surprisingly even pushed by so-called experts), heat pumps were a no-go (you can read all about it), and so on.

We should stop complaining from such a high level; going a bit back to basics wouldn’t hurt us...