The largest apartment owners in Germany

Text: Matti Schenk

Among the fragmented and regionally diverse ownership structure of the rental apartment market, a small number of major owners stand out. According to our research, at the end of the third quarter of 2018, 25 owners in Germany had holdings of approximately 30,000 apartments or more (see Table “The 25 largest apartment owners in Germany”). Combined, these players own more than 1.9 million rental apartments, or around 8% to 9% of the current rental apartment stock. The 25 largest owners include only nine private companies. However, seven of these private companies are among the ten largest apartment owners. The two largest apartment owners by far in Germany are Vonovia, with around 363,500 apartments, and Deutsche Wohnen, which owns around 163,100 apartments. Both are listed companies and operate throughout Germany. The regional focus of the Vonovia portfolio, which covers around 400 towns and cities, is on Berlin, Dresden and North Rhine-Westphalia. In the case of Deutsche Wohnen, around 71% of apartments owned are in Berlin. Based upon the census data, Vonovia and Deutsche Wohnen own approximately 10% of all rental apartments in Berlin combined. By the same measure, Vonovia owns around a quarter of all rental apartments in Kiel and approximately 15% of those in Dresden.

Property company LEG Immobilien, which operates in North Rhine-Westphalia, also owns more than 100,000 apartments, as does Vivawest, a housing company also focused on North Rhine-Westphalia. US investor BlackRock and the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund are among the largest investors in Vonovia, Deutsche Wohnen and LEG Immobilien. Meanwhile, Vivawest is backed by the RAG Stiftung, RAG AG, the Industriegewerkschaft Bergbau, Chemie, Energie and Evonik Pensionstreuhand e.V. The only municipal enterprise with a six-figure holding of apartments is Hamburg-based SAGA Unternehmensgruppe. The combined holdings of these five players are almost as large as the twenty next largest owners.