The Social Democratic Party (SPD) in the German capital of Berlin has announced plans to set up a special investigative unit to examine thousands of rental contracts for supposedly excessive rents.
Yesterday, President of the Hanover Region Steffen Krach (SPD) presented plans – dubbed “Operation Rent Reducer” – to hire around 100 “inspectors” to support the work of existing rent control authorities from January 2027 onwards.
The plans followed the decision of Berlin’s city government to set up a register of all of the German capital’s approximately 1.8 million rental apartments.
According to local laws, rent for an apartment may be considered “exorbitant” if it surpasses the local comparable rent by more than 50 per cent. Between 20 and 50 per cent above the comparable rent a rental agreement may be considered “excessive”.
Charging too much rent can constitute an administrative offence punishable by a fine of up to €50,000.
The SPD would like to raise this maximum fine as well.
Krach said landlords should get a grace period until the end of 2026, when the rental police unit will take up its work.
“After that we will systematically persecute infractions. We also are working towards raising the maximum fine to €100,000,” he said.
In April 2026, the Berlin city government – made up of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) of Chancellor Friedrich Merz and the SPD – had agreed on setting up a citywide “rent register”.
The register aims to catalogue the rental agreements for all of Berlin’s rental apartments with the goal of checking for excessive and exorbitant rents.
Landlords will be required to report rents, tenants, property size, furnishings and other details on their apartments to the register. The data will then be investigated for infractions against Germany’s and Berlin’s strict rental laws.
Landlord association Haus & Grund Berlin said on April 26 the register would create an ineffective “bureaucratic monster” and might be potentially unconstitutional.
Haus & Grund Chairman Carsten Brückner said: “With this proposal, the coalition is attempting to cover up its previous failures in Berlin’s housing policy. So far, nothing has been done to bring about any tangible relief in the city’s tight housing market.”
The rent register and the rent police may also serve as ways for the CDU and SPD to score points with voters ahead of the September 2026 local elections in Berlin.
A survey by pollster Infratest published on April 30 sees both government parties losing ground. The CDU (19 per cent) may lose its first place to the Greens, the hard-left Die Linke, or to the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD), all of which poll around 18 per cent.
The SPD polls a distant fifth at 14 per cent. As all parties have excluded any co-operation with AfD, though, the SDP is very likely to once again end up in power, either in a coalition with the CDU, or as part of a hard-left coalition with Die Linke and the Greens.
