The Berliners are in favor of the association of large real estate groups in the capital.
After counting in almost all electoral districts, 56.4 percent voted with “Yes” and 39.0 percent with “No” in the referendum, as can be seen from the figures published on the website of the State Returning Officer.
In the morning at 7.30 a.m., 3,759 out of 3,763 voting districts are counted.
Only in Pankow is still counted.
The vote is not legally binding on politics.
Because a specific bill was not voted on.
Nevertheless, the new Senate and the newly elected House of Representatives will have to deal with it.
The “Deutsche Wohnen & Co expropriate” initiative advocates the expropriation of housing groups with more than 3000 apartments in Berlin, but cooperatives should not be hit.
According to the resolution, the referendum calls on the Berlin Senate to “initiate all measures” that are required to convert real estate into common ownership and to draft a law for this purpose.
The initiative “Expropriate Deutsche Wohnen & Co.” announced that it would intensively accompany the upcoming coalition negotiations: “We do not accept delaying strategies or attempts to intercept them. We know all the tricks, ”said Kalle Kunkel, another spokesman for the initiative. “We will not give up until the socialization of housing groups has been implemented.” Specifically, the project, which is unique in Germany, concerns companies with more than 3,000 apartments in Berlin, provided they have an “intention to make a profit”. These are to be socialized, i.e. expropriated against compensation and transferred to an institution under public law. Around 240,000 apartments would be affected, around 15 percent of Berlin’s stock of rental apartments.
The “Deutsche Wohnen & Co expropriate” initiative, as the initiator of the referendum, believes that it will be able to stop the rise in rents and secure affordable rents in the long term with the help of the socialization of apartments. Whether the Berlin Senate will now draft such a law is open and depends on the political composition of the new state government. The SPD, CDU, AfD and FDP are - like business - against expropriations. The left is in favor of it without any ifs or buts, the Greens consider such a step “as a last resort” to be possible.
According to forecasts by the Senate, the compensation costs would amount to 29 to 36 billion euros.
The expropriation initiative, on the other hand, expects 7.3 to 13.7 billion euros.
She does not want to compensate the real estate company with money, but with bonds, which are then repaid over 40 years from the rental income.
In any case, such a project should end up in the Federal Constitutional Court.
Berlin last failed there in April with the rent cap, i.e. state-imposed upper limits for rents.