CROWDED BERLIN

Taranaki Daily News, 3 May 1930, Page 4

CROWDED BERLIN

DEMAND FOR CITY FLATS.

RENTING THE ...LANDLORDS.

Now that the final evacuation of the Rhineland is in sight and preparations are afoot for a great' celebration when zone, residents of Berlin metropolis are zone, resiidents of Berlin metropolis are beginning to ask:

"How about the evacuation of the fourth zone, the zone in which we renters of furnished' flats have to live? When are the landlords and landladies quartered on us ever since the war going .to pack up ,ami leave us \vita a little. pr-iva.cy?” One reason why Berliners .pqthised with -t'heir fellow-coqntrymcn in occupiicd territory-.-i«s that ..almost every tenant of a furnished flat here has an '•occupied zone” in his home — a room occupied by a landlord or landlady, who either doesn't want to live elsewhere or fears the wrath of the housing commission.

' Strictly speaking, no one’has a right to sublet a furnished flat- in Berlin merely for the profit it brings. If Herr Schmidt, paying 130 marks monthly for an unfurnished flat, puts furniture into into it and sublets it for 400 marks, he is liable to be. ousted by the housing commission unless he can show that the sub-tenants .are merely sharing it with him.

So the custom is to rent the landlord along with the flat, for better or worse. Flats of this semi-private character, fairly well furnMhed, can be had for from £l7 to £2O monthly. Tenants who rebel at paying so much without getting- ordinary privacy have the alternative' of trying to get a vacant flat and furnishing it. This amounts to trying rather than •to-getting, for the housing commission; has a list of' 220,000 Germans waiting for vacant'flats in Berlin. Nevertheless, by paying what is called an "abstfind,’or bonus, of between £5O and £l5O for a vacant lease, it is sometimes possible by pulling wires to get a fiat. Unfortunately tho most desirable flats usually are in a district where the housing commission is particularly •strict, and. the- wou.d-be tenant must produce proof that he has waited two years for a flat or. has an invalid wife or mother who will die if she has to stay where she iis. The upshot of it all is that people who cannot afford to pay "abstand,” and many who could afford to but caimot get the necessary urgent permit from the housing commission, live in furnished flats with landlord or landlady sharing the kitchen and bathroom.

But maybe in -a year or two enough new apartment houses will have been built in Berlin to justify a great evacuation of the “fourth zone.” What a celebration there will be then among the tenants! The Rhincland-Is-Free celebrations will seem like a gloomest compared to it. For what is freedom, but a little privacy?