It will be a historic moment when the European Central Bank (ECB) raises interest rates for the first time in eleven years this Thursday.

However, many interest rates that consumers have to deal with have recently risen somewhat - and that should continue, as the Internet portal Check 24 wrote in a study on Tuesday.

"Classic investments, such as money market or time deposit accounts, will become more attractive as part of the interest rate turnaround," said Moritz Felde, Managing Director Financial Services at Check 24. The first banks had increased interest rates, especially for short, but also for medium terms.

"We assume that this trend will continue and possibly accelerate over the course of the year - two and a half percent and more interest on a two-year fixed-term deposit could soon be possible again."

Christian Siedenbiedel

Editor in Business.

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At least in this direction, the interest rates had recently developed, especially from foreign institutions that want to collect savings in Germany, but also from lesser-known German institutions such as the SWK Südwest-Kreditbank.

In some cases, there may be higher risks, especially in institutions without a German deposit insurance.

But even at the savings banks, interest rates are rising again.

Inflation eats interest

The difficulty here is that, despite everything, these interest rates are so low that savers are making a loss in real terms, i.e. after deducting inflation.

The capital market expert Hans-Jörg Naumer from Allianz Global Investors even thinks that there is a trap for savers in terms of behavioral economics: If, with slightly higher positive nominal interest rates again, they put their money in a savings account without worrying instead of investing it elsewhere because the pain of loss is less, if the amount in the account doesn't decrease - then they might lose a lot more due to negative real interest rates as a result of high inflation.

Check 24 believes that construction interest rates will also continue to rise: "The average interest rate for ten-year construction financing has almost quadrupled from 0.8 percent at the start of the year and has climbed to over three percent," says Ingo Foitzik, Managing Director of construction financing at the company.

At this rate, an increase to four percent by late summer is possible.

"However, after the sharp increase in June, we are currently seeing slight interest rate cuts by the banks," emphasized Foitzik.

In any case, by the end of this year, average mortgage lending will have increased in price by a few thousand euros within the term.

"Consumers with ongoing financing should use the special repayment to keep the remaining debt as low as possible at the end of the term," says Foitzik:

First banks have abolished negative interest rates

It will be exciting to see how the negative interest rates of the banks for their savers will continue.

It is still somewhat unclear whether the ECB will now only reduce its negative deposit rates for banks and then completely abolish them in September, as it had actually announced.

There were reports on Tuesday that this could possibly happen on Thursday.

In any case, around a third of banks have a regulation that will automatically eliminate negative interest for customers if the ECB abolishes penalty interest for banks.

Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank had announced that they wanted to take such a step after the central bank.

The internet portal Verivox has also compiled an overview according to which a number of banks abolished their negative interest rates even before the ECB.

"Since the end of April, 34 banks have completely abolished their negative interest rates," writes Verivox.

At another 15 banks, the allowances have been increased significantly, so that at least the majority of customers no longer have to pay negative interest.

At another bank, VR Bank Südliche Weinstraße-Wasgau, the custody fees were dropped on August 1st.

In addition to online banks such as ING, N26 or 1822direkt, the banks that have already exited negative interest rates include many regional institutions, including several Sparda and PSD banks, but also Volksbanks and savings banks.

Stricter lending standards

In the meantime, the banks in Germany have apparently noticeably tightened their standards for granting construction loans.

According to an ECB survey of 153 institutions in the euro area published on Tuesday, the standards for lending to companies became stricter in the spring.

For the current summer quarter, the banks are likely to further tighten the standards, it said.

The German banks surveyed tightened their procurement guidelines only slightly, as the Bundesbank announced.

In the case of private housing loans, however, the tightening was stronger than at any time since the survey was launched.

The gloomy prospects on the residential real estate market and lower creditworthiness played the most important role.

For the third quarter, the banks are planning to be even more restrictive.