Berlin Property for Sale

About Nilreb and Berlin property Investment.

We started looking at Berlin in 2004/5 by assisting a hedge fund investigate the potential of investing in the Berlin property market, discovering some excellent investment opportunities in Berlin but we also found that it’s quite a different market to many Capitals around the world, in particular the UK and London, where many of our own clients are located, in a nutshell whilst London is very much a capital investment opportunity in that you are buying a physical property we found in Berlin you are more buying the income of the building, the building comes along with the income of course, but as an owner you really need a building with low or little maintenance, and that’s what the banks like to see.

Location, Location, Location.

Very true in the UK and in particular in London, perhaps true in a different way in Berlin, we found that in the more traditional West of Berlin in areas such as Charlottenberg the rental prices were quite high with little scope for noticeable growth, but in the East side of Berlin rents were much lower but demand was much higher than in the West with many people looking to get away from having to move with ‘the kitchen’ in the East as the many restaurants, bars and clubs grew so did demand, and many people were demanding better quality apartments with fitted kitchens and nice shower or bathrooms,

We found buildings that had tenants paying very low rents having lived in the apartment for 10 or 20 years, when they moved out there was the possibility to refurbish the apartment, sometimes apartments just need to be refreshed with some paint and new varnish on the floors, the open market rents for the new refreshed apartments in some of the trendy areas like Nekölln and Kreuzberg are significantly higher than long term old tenants were paying in some cases 2 or 3 times higher, but refurbishment cost have to be taken into account as well.

Warren Buffet and us.

Warren Buffet can read a balance sheet of a company very well, always looking for hidden value of indicators of future performance, so we took the Warren Buffet approach in Berlin and became very good at reading rent lists to look for hidden value and future performance indicators, a rent list in Berlin will tell you more than looking at the building, it a big clue that many banks can give you an indication of the loan they could give you form a rent list without seeing the actual building, but you have to make sure the buildings ok, but to the bank the rent is the key factor no how pretty or even if your building is in the best street in Berlin, if the rent list does not pass the Warren Buffet test, it’s not going to stand up to bank scrutiny either and the bank offer will reflect that very accurately.

We can help you with the following:

Property sourcing to a specific specification, i.e. price, location, yield.

Funding for any property.

Contact with RICS Berlin surveyors.

Solicitors and Notary contacts.

Professional property management.

Monthly English Management Accounts.

Local accountants and tax advisors.

Refurbishment and maintenance of buildings and apartments within your buildings.

Apartment rental to both the local market and expat market.

Apartment furnishing.

Ongoing owner support.

Please feel fee to contact John Aitken if you have any questions about investing in Berlin or about Berlin property.