Berlin to buy 15,000 flats for 2.46 bln euros - city senator

Deutsche Wohnen SE

17/09/2021 11:00

BERLIN, Sept 17 (Reuters) - German residential rental
companies Vonovia VNAn.DE   and Deutsche Wohnen  DWNG.DE  are
selling almost 15,000 apartments to Berlin for 2.46 billion
euros  ($2.90 billion), the city state's finance senator
Matthias Kollatz said on Friday.
    The acquisition comes nine days before elections in the
German capital, where housing shortages and rapidly rising
prices have become a hot issue. An advisory referendum on
expropriating the two housing companies is due to be held in
parallel with the city election.
    Vonovia, the largest German residential rental company is in
the process of acquiring its smaller competitor, creating a
housing behemoth with some 550,000 apartments worth more than 80
billion euros.


($1 = 0.8488 euros)

 (Reporting by Mattias Inverardi
Editing by Tomasz Janowski)
 ((thomas.escritt@thomsonreuters.com; @tomescritt; +49 30 2201
33579;))