For families living in Germany, housing is becoming increasingly unaffordable. It has become known how much one needs to earn in order to afford an apartment in German cities. 

To afford to buy property in Germany with an area of 90 square meters, the monthly income of a family of three people must be €5,000 (before taxes). This is true for about half of the German cities (about 80), as in more expensive cities it will not be the same amounts at all. 

What is the basis for this data? This result was obtained by the Immowelt platform by calculating the monthly expenses of a family of three with an average gross income of €1,500 per adult; and analyzing how their income would change if they took out a mortgage on a two-bedroom first-floor house (built in the 1990s) with a 4.2% interest rate.

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In more expensive cities, such as Munich and Hamburg, housing costs are many times higher, so the income must be twice as high. As stated in a study by Immowelt, families in Munich and Hamburg must earn €10,000 per month before taxes to afford to buy a home. 

To give you an example, a 90-square meter property in Munich costs about €823,590. That is, at the current standard interest rate, the monthly mortgage payment would be €4,255. 

As for the German capital, Berlin, a family of three must have a monthly income of about €8,000 to buy a property.

What are the reasons for the increasingly unaffordable property prices? The Immowelt platform cites rising construction costs as the main reason. Houses and apartments that might have been available for families to buy in 2021 are no longer so.