The "fair rent model": how to make the heating transition a success

Germany is lagging far behind its climate targets. There is still a lot to be done, especially in the building sector. Otherwise, it hardly seems possible to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by a third by 2030. However, neither the political framework nor the current tenancy law provide effective incentives to save. Homeowners are therefore reluctant to carry out energy-efficient renovations. They themselves shy away from bureaucracy and costs, while their tenants fear massive increases. Yet there is a fundamental willingness on both sides to save energy.

As part of the "Innovations for the energy transition" research program, the University of Kassel (Department of Civil Law, Corporate and Competition Law, Prof. Dr. Martina Deckert) has developed an innovative, practical billing concept together with the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, the West Saxon University of Applied Sciences Zwickau and the Institute for Housing and the Environment. It brings together the interests of tenants, landlords and politicians, and ultimately benefits the climate.

In order to create stronger incentives for energy-efficient refurbishment, the "Fair Rent Model" proposes a variant of the so-called partial warm rent. The basic rent to be paid by the tenant in the fair rent model is made up of the fixed net cold rent and fixed basic heating costs, which are calculated on the basis of the energy requirement together with the size of the apartment and the energy costs and are to be paid by the tenant on a permanent monthly basis. For landlords, this provides an incentive to reduce energy costs by renovating the building to make it more energy efficient, as they now also bear a proportion of the costs for the ongoing heating supply for the first time; for tenants, the total rent remains the same and they are also encouraged to save energy, as they continue to pay a proportion of the actual energy consumption after annual billing.

The interdisciplinary project took socio-economic, ecological and legal aspects into account. On the one hand, it was based on months of measurements of indoor and outdoor temperatures in 200 households of the municipal housing company "jenawohnen". On the other hand, around 1,000 tenants and landlords were surveyed in detail and experts from the housing industry (including property managers, billing companies and energy consultants) were involved in workshops.

Contact: 
Prof. Dr. Martina Deckert
University of Kassel
Department of Civil Law, Corporate and Competition Law
https://www.uni-kassel.de/fb07/iwr/buergerliches-recht-gesellschafts-und-wettbewerbsrecht/team/prof-dr-martina-deckert.html