Initiatives will be carried out in these specific locations:

In the fall, the city of Gießen will officially be classified as an area with a tense housing market by the Hessian state government. This classification brings concrete changes for private landlords, particularly for new rentals, and places additional burdens on tenants.

With this classification, Gießen will have more opportunities to combat housing vacancy and facilitate building law requirements to promote housing construction. The rent brake will now apply in Gießen, limiting rental increases to 10% above local comparative rent. However, there are exceptions for apartments that have been comprehensively modernized.

New construction cannot meet the demand for housing in Gießen, and as a result, conversions of rental apartments into owner-occupied apartments will be made more difficult due to this classification. The city can apply building law instruments within the framework of the new classification to promote housing construction and create additional housing.

The vacancy law of the state of Hesse allows authorities to take action against apartments that have been vacant for a long time in Gießen. Tenants in the city and district of Gießen are currently experiencing an increased burden from rents, and the rent burden threshold is now being used as an indicator for Gießen's housing market.

Despite low rents and minimal increases over time, Gießen's housing market may soon be formally classified as tense due to these signs. Five years ago, unlike other cities in Hesse, Gießen did not fully meet the criteria of a tense housing market. However, indications suggest that the assessment of the situation in Gießen may have changed.

The basis for this re-evaluation is the updated Gutachten by the IWU Institute, which has not been published yet. The responsible person in the Hessian Ministry of Economic Affairs who communicated that Gießen meets the criteria for a tense housing market area under the new assessments is not explicitly named in the provided search results.

Arman, the social department head, has hope that future instruments can ease the housing situation in Gießen. He believes that the city's continued growth and high demand for housing will require innovative solutions to ensure a stable and affordable housing market for all residents.