Panel discussion: How do we make our residential buildings fit for the CO2-neutral future?
Under the moderation of Michael Fabricius, senior WELT editor for real estate, Parliamentary State Secretary Sören Bartol (SPD), CEO Dominik Campanella and Axel Gedaschko, President of the Federal Association of German Housing and Real Estate Companies, discussed the reduction of CO2 emissions in housing construction.
Demand for real estate loans remains at a low level, even falling significantly in the second quarter compared to the first. The Association of Pfandbrief Banks cites uncertainties about further price and interest rate developments as the reason.
DAccording to information from the industry, the large real estate financiers in Germany had to accept a strong setback in new business at the beginning of the year. The investors united in the Association of Pfandbrief Banks (VDP) granted real estate loans of over EUR 25.6 billion in the first quarter. This is a drop of 47.8 percent compared to the first three months of the previous year, as the VDP announced on Monday.
However, in the first quarter of 2022 eachieved a record result, partly because transactions were brought forward in anticipation of rising interest rates. The comparison with the last quarter of 2022 looks better with an increase of 3.2 percent. According to the VDP, however, demand remains at a low level.
“The adjustment of price expectations by buyers and sellers, which has not yet been completed, leads to few transactions and thus also to little new business among real estate financiers,” summarized VDP General Manager Jens Tolckmitt. The leading financiers for residential and commercial construction have joined forces in the VDP. In the first quarter of this year, customers of the VDP member institutes asked for 16.3 billion euros in residential real estate loans. This is 49.2 percent less than in the particularly strong prior-year period, but still down 4.2 percent on the previous quarter.
Loans were primarily in demand for one- and two-family houses (44 percent), followed by apartment buildings (36 percent), condominiums (15 percent) and others such as building land (five percent).
In the first three months of this year, office buildings accounted for 52 percent of the commercial property financed by the VDP institutes, followed by retail properties with 35 percent. The volume of loans granted totaled EUR 9.3 billion – a decrease of 45 percent compared to the same period last year, but an increase of 19.2 percent in the fourth quarter of 2022. For the VDP general manager, however, this is no reason for optimism: “As long as the current phase of uncertainty about further price and interest rate developments is not over, demand for financing is likely to remain subdued,” predicted Tolckmitt.
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