Overview
- Published as the Sozialer Wohn-Monitor 2026, the Pestel-Institut analysis—commissioned by the Bündnis Soziales Wohnen—calculates a nationwide deficit at end-2024 of about 1.4 million apartments concentrated in lower-cost and social housing.
- Completions fell to roughly 220,000 last year and permitting signals similar output in the near term, far under the pace required to close the gap by 2030.
- Regional shortages are most acute in North Rhine-Westphalia (around 376,000) and Bavaria (about 233,000), with further deficits in Baden-Württemberg and the city-states including Berlin, Hamburg and Bremen.
- Advocacy groups call for a Bund–Länder pact and a rapid expansion of subsidized homes to at least two million, warning that staggered federal payouts force states to pre-finance projects and slow delivery.
- Younger people, seniors and people with disabilities are most affected, with missed apprenticeships, rising forced moves in old age and evidence that roughly half of renter households now qualify for a social-housing permit.