🎯 STRisker: Bulletin - Germany
New "Mietrecht II" reforms extend rent caps to six-month contracts, limit index increases to 3.5%, and require transparent furniture pricing
Germany Cracks Down on Short-Term Rental Loophole
Photo by Philippe Oursel
Germany's Justice Minister Stefanie Hubig unveiled a second wave of rental reforms on February 8, 2026, designed to plug loopholes in the country's rent brake law that landlords have exploited since 2015. The draft legislation, currently in public consultation until March 6, directly addresses three major workarounds used to bypass rent controls in Germany's 410 designated "strained housing markets."
Tenants in big cities like Berlin are being exploited by the use of legal loopholes to circumvent rent control laws. The government is now finally planning to introduce new rules for furnished and short-term rentals. https://t.co/hrKKM1QZiD
— DW News (@dwnews) February 12, 2026
The reforms target 3 key loopholes:
📄 Short-term rental contracts: Rent brake protections now extend to all contracts exceeding six months. Previously, short-term leases operated outside regulatory boundaries, allowing landlords to sidestep the 10% cap above local comparative rents through rolling temporary contracts. Under the new rules, the tenant must provide a reason for signing a short-term contract, closing a gap that rental policy expert Hanna Steinmüller called one of multiple ways landlords circumvent protections.
📃 Index-linked contracts: These contracts face a new 3.5% annual ceiling in tight housing markets: a direct response to rent spikes of up to 7% during the 2022 inflation surge.
🏠 Furnished apartments: Landlords must separately itemize furniture charges, with a proposed 5% cap on the base rent for fully furnished units. If landlords fail to disclose the furniture surcharge, the apartment legally counts as unfurnished, triggering full rent brake coverage.
🪬 Additional protections: Landlords cannot evict tenants who settle rent arrears, even after falling two months behind. Meanwhile, an expert commission launched in September 2025 is developing proposals for bußgeld penalties against rent brake violations, with results expected by December 31, 2026.
Expert Commission on Tenancy Law - Supplementary Information
Critics point to enforcement as the real test. Germany faces a 1.4 million housing unit deficit, and when the Left Party launched a free rent calculator in November 2024, 220,000 tenants used it within a year; two-thirds discovered they were being overcharged. Greens representative Steinmüller dismissed the reforms as "the absolute minimum," arguing genuine rent control requires lower caps and enforceable tenant rights.
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