Reuters Press Release declares German homes “as good as Gold”

Well, today we can refer to an interesting headline of a press release from Reuters; its apparently only availabe in English, at least I did not find its German pendant. “German homes as good as Gold” is what it says. We advise to study that article in its full length. As a comment: We have been saying since the year 1999 on our international website that the German market is stable, secure and attractive for foreign investors. And we focussed on residential not commercial property as this is the really stable market.

Whereas cities like Hamburg, Stuttgart, Dresden, Leipzig, Duesseldorf have their interesting aspects and potential, we focussed on the main International Airport regions where foreign investors can reach their property within a day if they have to. Fortunately they practically never had to, since we also managed the rental of such property very successful in the recent years. So as far as we can say, we are lucky to offer since 10 years what the news release of Reuters promoted as a good news a few days ago.

But we also recommend to look very carefully in which city a foreign investor is placing his investment. Not only the size and international “reach” of a City is of importance, but also its employment situation, quality of live and living standards, and future developments. The chances are good that Frankfurt wins the prize over Hamburg and Munich in the next years if all developments get done as planned, but on the other side the banking crisis leaves some uncertainties.

Currently the rental market for unfurnished apartments in Frankfurt can be said to be excellent, the rental market for the normally higher yield property furnished is downtrending.

So the higher yield of 7-8% on furnished apartments is more liable to be averaged out by economy fluctuations than the unfurnished more stable 5-6% yield. Additional risks of having a tenant on an unlimited lease in an unfurnished apartment are higher than in a furnished one. In the end, there are plusses and minusses for each and I would say, the personal ambition of the investor is what finally decides whether he rents furnished or unfurnished. The properties we sold in the recent years almost all were rented out unfurnished, only when an investor insisted on letting furnished did we do so. But we have a lot of furnished property by German house owners who ask us to assist in the rental, and thats why we can say we really have a balanced view on the market.