Construction industry

The "Social Housing" alliance is calling on the federal and state governments to launch a joint "social housing offensive". A special fund of 50 billion euros must be made available by the state for social housing by 2025 in order to achieve the target of 400,000 social housing units by the end of the legislative period. Only 20,000 social housing units were built in 2022. The alliance is also calling for...

Interested parties can still apply for the Aerogel Architecture Award 2023 until Sunday, April 30, 2023 (11:59 p.m.). The "Realized Solutions" category is looking for internationally realized projects by architects and civil engineers in which aerogel is used in a special way. Students can submit their project ideas in the "Student designs" category.

The Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development (BBSR) has looked at living conditions in cities, districts and regions against the backdrop of the coronavirus pandemic and published a corresponding publication. The "Atlas of Urban and Regional Development" is also dedicated to the area of housing. Among other things, the authors have analyzed the development of rental and...

The price of new-build apartments rose by around 17% from November 2021 to November 2022. This was reported by the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis). Increased prices for various services and materials are likely to have had a significant impact on this. According to Destatis, prices for roofing and sealing work, among other things, rose by 20.3% in the period in question, while prices for...

Roofers and electricians will cooperate in future to pool their knowledge of photovoltaic systems. This was decided by the Central Association of German Electrical and IT Trades (ZVEH) and the Central Association of German Roofers (ZVDH). As part of the cooperation, further training in relation to photovoltaic systems is planned, among other things. The aim of the...

If home builders want to create a raised wooden bed in their garden, on their patio or on their balcony, they can find tips on the "bauen.de" portal. First, 2.5 to 5 centimetre thick wooden slats (depending on requirements) must be purchased for the side walls as well as squared timber or posts for stabilization and coated with an appropriate protective glaze. Then the...

According to the Association of Private Builders (VPB), owners should promote biodiversity in home gardens and avoid stone deserts. The VPB also provides some tips on how this can be achieved. For example, owners should opt for insect-friendly hedges with plants such as red dogwood, field maple or hornbeam instead of cherry laurel and thuja hedges. This is because the latter are...

Improvements to the framework conditions for new construction, special depreciation for affordable rental apartments in tight housing markets and more incentives for home ownership - this is what the German Building Materials Association, the Federation of the German Construction Industry, the Central Association of the German Construction Industry (ZDB) and the German Confederation of Skilled Crafts call for in their position paper...

Builders can now also have so-called energy-plus houses built. The portal "effizienzhaus-online.de" points this out. Energy-plus houses are houses that not only save energy, but can also produce energy. The principle of energy-plus houses is based on more efficient building use and therefore...

More than 80 people from 65 German municipalities took part in two workshops to discuss how cities can make themselves climate-proof and better protected against extreme weather events. The twelve recommendations for action from the project "ExTrass - 'Urban resilience to extreme weather events - typologies and transfer of adaptation strategies in cities' were presented in a policy brief....