Hallo all,

My Flat owner(85 year old Single) has sent a letter today saying that Miete(NK) is increased from 580€ to 640€ from next month onwards. She has not shown any courtesy of discussing with me before making her one sided decision.

Is it allowed to increase miete by over 10% on a Year to Year basis ? Normally 5% should be OK, but do we have some standard rates to increase miete ? please share your experiences.

Regards,
Truster

@truster,

you do not mention whther your rent=Miete or NK is increased. If only NK is increased, then ask her to provide supported document such as heating expenses, water bills. Otherwise she cant increase 10% rent/Miete in one year by just sending you a letter written by herself. If it is increase in Miete, then just challange her by sending a written reply and ask for reasons and wait if she send letter through a lawyer, but in that case you also have to respond with a letter through lawyer. Also pls get in touch with Mietverein in your area. Generally, i appreciate dialy life in Germany and its people, but constantly it is observed that most of aulanders are victims of landlords, who try to exploit by checking that most of us are helpless by language and local laws and since everything here works through lawyer, at first attempt they assume that we normally do not carry lawyer insurance. I have seen in 90% cases if you also reply through lawyer, they simply back off. Wish you good luck..

@truster,
one more note, in real terms actually sh must obey the notice period rule in your contract, which means she has to inform you enough in advance atleast 3 months before actually increasing the rent. this is to give you enough time to stay or leave the flat. BUT mind that she has to logically expalin as what value addition she is doing such as maintinanace etc which forces her to increase rent. Also note that rent laws are very much favourable in favour of tenant. So in any case she cant simply increase the rent or kick you out.

Thank you Subir79 for the clarity.

You said it right. My Land lady is trying to exploit because of our lacking in the undestanding of local rules. In fact she has rented all her four flats to Auslanders for obvious advantages. No German would agree to get trapped like this, as they know how to give back someone of this kind.

for every IT foreigner living in Germany, Mieterschutzvereine membership is a must. This was discussed several times.

I saved 1100 euro with the help of Mieterschutzvereine.

Here is a rough outline regarding the legality of a rent increase and the question of increasing running costs. Both have not to be confused.

Rent increase

In order to increase the rent the landlord first of all has to seek your approval. Sounds weird? Why? It is a contract, after all. The tenant, therefore, has to approve of the rent increase. That means the landlord cannot just increase the rent one-sidedly. The landlord, however, has a legal claim against the tenant to approve of the increase, provided that the sought increase is justified, i.e. conformant with the law.

So, when is the increase justified?

Excluding a rent increase because of measures the landlord undertook to upgrade and improve the object (modernisation), and also, excluding a predetermined rent increase in the contract (so called Staffelmiete), broadly speaking,the landlord has to observe the following:

- The landlord has to respect the ceiling of any increase. The ceiling or outer limit is the normal comparable rent, that is the rent that is normally charged for a flat of the same type in the same area as the one in question. The landlord is not allowed to go beyond it. He, therefore, has to substantiate that the new rent is within that ceiling. In many cities the communal authorities have published special schedules, so called “Mietspiegel”, that reflect, or mirror, the rent-scape in the city. So the landlord in demonstrating that the rent is comparable to other similar flats can resort to the Mietspiegel.

- The rent has to stay unchanged for the last 15 months.

- The landlord can seek the tenant’s approval to a rent increase at the earliest of one year after the last increase .

- As a rule the rent shall not exceed 30 per cent within three years in relation to the last increase.

And again, even if the rise is justified, the tenant has still to approve of it. If he approves the tenant owes the increased rent with the beginning of the third month after receiving the notice. The law says the tenant has to give his approval at the latest of the end of the second month following the landlord’s notice to increase the rent. If the tenant does not approve, the landlord has to file a suit in court no later than another three months after that. If the increase is not justified, simply do not pay. The act of paying itself could be construed as an approval.

Increase of Running costs

Running costs are a whole new ball game.

Here, first of all, look into the contract. It must be explicitly stated that you have to bear the running costs, that you have to pay an advanced lump sum (so. called Betriebskostenpauschale) and that the landlord is entitled to pass on increases to you, the tenant.

Second, such increases must have actually occurred. The landlord has to state why the running costs have increased. A lot of abuse is done with running costs. Not all costs incurred by the landlord are running costs in the sense of the law. The costs are defined in a bylaw the so called BetriebskostenVO. Also, running costs have to be differentiated from maintenance costs. These costs cannot be foisted onto the tenant. The same is true for administration costs. Take for example the janitor. If he is on contract with the landlord getting a fixed annual salary and his activities include maintenance and/or administrative work, then these hidden costs have to extracted from the salary. Another common example is the lift. Here costs resulting from repair work cannot be imposed on the tenant. Furthermore, the landlord has to be economical when it comes to contracts with third parties. As it is those costs that he later seeks to pass on to the tenant. In the yearly bill of costs (so called Betriebskostenabrechnung) the landlord has to outline the total costs, the partial costs arising for the tenant, explain the distributive factor and deduct the monthly advanced lump sum. Should he find that the monthly sums are less than the partial costs for the particular tenant, then there is a de facto dead line up to when he is entitled to demand the difference. Usually that is 12 months after the end of the relevant “fiscal” year. The deadline is observed when the tenant receives the bill of costs as outlined above within this time frame. Regarding costs exceeding the combined monthly lump for the “fiscal” year 2007, the bill of costs – with the content as outlined above - must reach the tenant no later than the 31st of December 2008. Only then is the landlord entitled to come up later and demand the difference, within the normal statute of limitation, that is. The tenant himself should voice his objections to the bill of costs in writing as soon as he receives it. The law gives the tenant a longer time, though. The tenant is entitled to go to the landlord and examine whether all the costs included in the bill of costs have actually been incurred by the landlord and are not (hidden) maintenance charges by checking the invoices.

Rechtsanwalt_Jain(at)yahoo(dot)de