Applying for housing benefit for the first time or again
Description
You can apply for housing benefit if you have a low income above the basic income support level and belong to one of these groups of people:
- pensioners with a low pension
- Working families, single parents and couples with low incomes
- Employees in the low-wage sector
- Students, unless the entire household is entitled to BAföG
- Residents of care homes
You can receive housing benefit as
- receive a rent allowance. This applies if, for example:
- have rented living space
- live in accommodation as a subtenant
- live in a facility, for example for people with disabilities
- receive an encumbrance allowance if you own your own home or a condominium.
As a rule, housing benefit is granted for 12 months. If your income remains the same, the approval period can be up to 24 months. After that, you must submit an application for continued benefit.
If the costs of accommodation are covered by another social benefit provider, you are not entitled to housing benefit. This is the case, for example, with
- Citizen's allowance
- Basic income support in old age
- Basic income support for reduced earning capacity
- Assistance with living expenses
Furthermore, people who receive one of the following benefits do not receive housing benefit:
- Support for training in accordance with the Federal Training Assistance Act (BAföG)
- Vocational training allowance and training allowance
- Securing living expenses while participating in the special program "Promotion of the professional mobility of young people interested in training and unemployed skilled workers from Europe" (MobiPro-EU)
This also applies if you are only entitled to these benefits in principle. In these cases, the benefit will only be denied in terms of the amount. However, if at least one member of your household is not entitled to one of these benefits, for example the child of a single parent or the parents of students, you are still entitled to housing benefit. This also applies if you receive the benefits exclusively as a loan.
All regions in Germany are divided into 7 different rent levels, as rents vary greatly. The upper income limits for entitlement to housing benefit vary accordingly. You can use a housing benefit calculator to work out in advance whether you are entitled to housing benefit. If you have a fluctuating income, create an income forecast based on the last 12 months.
There is a special case if you have to move to another home as a result of a flood disaster because your previous home is no longer habitable. In this case, you can also apply for housing benefit for rooms that are only intended for temporary living. These can be, for example
- Caravans
- houseboats
Emergency accommodation such as dormitories, schools or gymnasiums do not count as living space. You only need to submit documents and evidence that may have been destroyed within 6 months. If living space for which you are already receiving housing benefit has become uninhabitable, this decision becomes invalid.
Housing benefit is a state subsidy towards housing costs which is intended to enable people with low incomes to live in suitable accommodation.
Housing benefit is available as:
- Rent subsidy for tenants of an apartment or subtenants
- Encumbrance allowance for owners of a home or condominium who live in the property themselves
The responsibility depends on the first letter of your surname.
The following are not eligible to apply:
- Single conscripts during their basic military service
- Trainees and students who receive a vocational training allowance or support under the Federal Training Assistance Act (BAföG) and who live alone in their own household, unless the benefit is paid exclusively as a loan.
- Persons who receive so-called transfer benefits (ALG II, social benefit according to SGB II, basic security benefits in old age and in the event of reduced earning capacity, benefits for subsistence - social assistance - according to SGB XII, benefits for supplementary assistance for subsistence or other assistance, in an institution or a home that includes subsistence, benefits according to the Asylum Seekers Benefits Act...
Note: You can read the text in plain language here.
You are entitled to a rent subsidy as a:
- Tenants of living space
- Subtenant of living space
- Residents of a cooperative or foundation apartment
- Residents of a residential home
- tenants with similar rights of use, in particular holders of a tenancy-like permanent right of residence
- Owners of an apartment building with three or more apartments, a commercial building or a business, if you live in this building
- Owners of a detached or semi-detached house in which you live, but which also contains business premises to such an extent that it can no longer be regarded as your own home
- Owners of a full-time agricultural business whose residential part is not separate from the business part
- women who live in women's shelters
- a person who has been placed in homeless accommodation or third-party accommodation by the homelessness authority
You are eligible for a housing allowance as:
- Owners of their own home or condominium
- Owners of a small housing estate
- Owners of an agricultural part-time job
- Owners of a full-time agricultural property if the residential and commercial parts are separate and a housing allowance calculation can be made for the residential part
- Owners of a permanent right of residence similar to ownership
- holders of heritable building rights and those who are entitled to the transfer of ownership of the building or apartment or to the transfer or granting of the heritable building right
In all cases, you must live in the property yourself and pay the costs yourself.
- Apply for housing benefit from your competent housing benefit authority either using the appropriate form or informally by post, e-mail, fax or telephone
Depending on your situation, you may need to submit documents. This includes, for example
- Identity documents of all household members
- Proof of your right of residence if you come from a non-EU country
- Proof of income for all household members, for example
- Salary statements
- Pension statements
- Short-time working allowance
- If applicable, proof of
- work-related expenses
- Severe disability
- degree of care
- Proof of transfer payments from all household members, for example
- Notice of unemployment benefit or citizen's allowance
- Notification of basic income support with calculation sheet
- Notification of advance maintenance payments from the youth welfare office
- for self-employed persons: last tax assessment
To apply for a rent subsidy, you will also need the completed
- landlord certificate form, which is usually provided by the housing benefit authorities
To apply for an encumbrance allowance, you will need the following documents, for example
- Extract from the land register
- purchase contract
- Debt certificates for loans still to be paid
- Calculation of living space
If you are applying for housing benefit because you have been affected by a flood disaster, you have 6 months to submit documents and evidence that may have been destroyed.
There are no costs.
You submit the application no later than the last day of the month from which you wish to apply for housing benefit.
The processing time depends, among other things, on the completeness of your information and the submission of the evidence required for processing the application.
Longer processing times are not at your expense: the entitlement to housing benefit is checked from the month in which the application is submitted. If you are already entitled to housing benefit, you will not lose any housing benefit.
- Objection
- Appeal
- You will find further information on how to lodge an objection or submit a complaint in the notification of your application for housing benefit.
Housing benefit authority
- You submit your application in writing using the form provided or using the online service.
- You can send the form by post to the housing benefit office responsible for you or hand it in in person.
- The authority will check your application and send you a decision.
- If approved, the housing benefit is usually granted for 12 months.
You are obliged to provide all information truthfully. The housing benefit authority is entitled to check your details by comparing your data. The verification of your details is permitted up to 10 years after receipt of the housing benefit notice.
Applications and consultations are made according to the first letter of the applicant's surname
- Please note that housing benefit is only paid from the month in which the application is submitted to the relevant office
- Further information, advice and current information on housing benefit as well as the housing benefit tables can be found on the website of theFederal Ministry of Transport, Building and Urban Development and in the information sheets.
Sample calculation for housing benefit
Housing benefit is only granted on application from the first of the month in which it is applied for. If the legal requirements are met, there is usually a legal entitlement for a period of 12 months. If no changes are expected, the housing benefit authority can grant the benefit for up to 24 months. If there are significant changes in income or rent within this period, a recalculation will be carried out.
Those entitled to apply include wage and salary earners, job seekers (ALG I recipients), self-employed persons, freelancers, pensioners, trainees, students and recipients of parental allowance (this list is not exhaustive).
However, recipients of transfer payments where the costs of accommodation and heating are already covered are excluded from housing benefit. These include unemployment benefit II or social benefit according to SGB II, basic income support according to SGB XII, assistance with living expenses according to SGB XI or benefits according to the AsylbLG.
Furthermore, housing benefit cannot be granted if the household exceeds the income limits or has too little income to cover its own living costs. Trainees or students who are entitled to BAB or BAföG or persons who are not tenants or owners of the living space for which housing benefit is applied for and who do not pay rent are also not entitled to housing benefit.
The basis for calculating housing benefit as a rent subsidy is the gross cold rent, which is made up of the net cold rent and the cold operating costs. A permanent heating cost component will be introduced as a supplement to the rent to be taken into account in order to take into account the considerable additional burdens caused by the sharp rise in heating costs. There will also be a climate component that will cushion structural rent increases due to energy-related measures in the building sector on a flat-rate basis. The heating costs and climate components are deliberately designed as lump sums in order to provide incentives to save energy.
The following examples are intended to give an impression of the housing benefit amounts in selected cases:
1) A single person in a 50 m² apartment with EUR 450 total rent (of which EUR 80 is heating costs), EUR 17.97 cable charges and a pension of EUR 1,100 net receives around EUR 150 housing benefit.
2) A single parent with a net income of around EUR 1,500.00, a maintenance payment of EUR 250 for one child and a total rent of EUR 620 (including heating costs of EUR 120) is entitled to approximately EUR 210 housing benefit.
3) For a 4-person household in which parent A earns around EUR 2,000 net, parent B receives EUR 750 unemployment benefit and the total rent is EUR 840 (of which EUR 190 is heating costs), this is likely to result in a housing benefit entitlement of EUR 180.
Federal Ministry of Housing, Urban Development and Building (BMWSB)
26.06.2025
The text was automatically translated based on the German content.
The text was automatically translated based on the German content.
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