GDR apartment blocks up for auction for from 1,071 euros per apartment

New life for “Lost Place” in Stendal?

16.3.2025

10,000 people lived, lived and loved in this and other apartment buildings south of the railroad line at the time of reunification in 1990. Today, 35 years later, most of the 5-storey prefabricated buildings are gone. The others have been empty for at least 10 years.

Stendal-South is the name of this “lost place”.

Is Stendal really a lost city?

You’ll see in the course of the article.

Apartment buildings will be auctioned off at the end of the month:

• A minimum bid of EUR 95,000 has been set for Bremer Strasse 2-6 with 50 apartments and a living space of around 4,453 m².

  If no one but you were bidding, you would pay 1,900 euros per apartment. That’s what others pay in rent per quarter for a prefabricated apartment!

  

• The average price per apartment in the block Hanseallee 57-65 (odd), 65 A and Lemgoer Strasse 2, 4 and 6 would be just 1,071 euros. This largest block contains 168 residential units with an area of around 11,390 m². Minimum bid 180,000 euros.

  

• Hanseallee 25 to 39 (odd) comprises 96 apartments on 8,313 m². The minimum bid is 135,000 euros.

  

• 175,000 euros is the minimum bid for the 120 residential units on around 10,545 m² at Hanseallee 2, 2a, 4-13 (even), 14A.

  

Rental as a business model?

Würde es einem Investor gelingen, voll zu vermieten, würden ihm monatlich 217.228 Euro in die Kasse fließen. At least if the average rent in Stendal of 6.26 euros per m² for 34,701 m² is taken as a basis. The prices per square meter for rental apartments in Stendal range between 5.10 euros and 10.36 euros.

Calculated over the year, that would be 2.6 million euros!

But is that realistic?

Dass man mit Vermietungen gutes Geld verdienen kann, ja.

Yes, you can earn good money with rentals.

Whether these apartment blocks will lead the way to success for 434 tenants and a private investor is completely open, because:

1. With 10 years of vacancy, unkempt facilities with some vandalism, a lot of money would first have to be spent to make the apartments rentable.
2. In 2000, the Stendal City Council decided to abandon and demolish the southern residential area in light of the population exodus. Of course, the city can only demolish its own property. In the past, half of the houses, outdoor facilities, parking lots and some other infrastructure have disappeared. For example, the district heating.
3. Will it be possible to let several hundred apartments in the prefabricated building style?

Let’s take a look at the city

Stendal is the district town of the district of the same name in the north-east of the state of Saxony-Anhalt. The districts in Saxony-Anhalt were formed in 1994 according to the number of inhabitants. The more people, the smaller the area of the district. The district of Stendal is the largest in terms of area. Around 107,000 people live in the district. The district town has just under 38,000.

Renovated apartments in Stendal city center are in the highest demand and command the highest rents. 10 minutes on foot to the ICE train station.

Prefabricated building district “Stadtsee”/h3>

There are apartments of a similar type in the “Stadtsee” district. Most of them belong to the city-state-owned Stendaler Wohnungsbaugesellschaft mbH (SWG) or the Wohnungsbau-Genossenschaft “Altmark” eG (WBGA).

Block of flats in Albrecht-Dürer-Straße. Nobody lives here anymore. An ancient bus with Russian license plates is parked here. Occasionally, people from neighboring blocks cross the road. German is hardly spoken here.

SWG

SWG refused to be interviewed or to provide even simple information.

On its website, it states that it had demolished around 3,000 apartments by 2013 and now still has 4,000 residential units. The vacancy rate is less than 7 percent.

If you look at the many empty parking spaces and even fewer curtains on the windows in front of some SWG blocks on Google Street View, you can assume that the published figures do not accurately reflect the picture. In addition, it was leaked to our editorial team that SWG is indeed continuing to carry out demolition work. The Volksstimme and AZ-online reported accordingly.

WBGA

The WBGA, which belongs to its members, was open to a discussion. They too have demolished blocks of flats in recent decades. Instead of continuing to flatten the slab, there are joint efforts with the Berlin architect Jurek Brüggen to transform potential demolition blocks into quasi-stacked single-family homes with plenty of space and greenery.

Vacancy rate is higher than communicated

Even though both major housing providers only have a few vacant apartments on the market, don’t be fooled. There are more vacancies that are not on offer. Further demand for housing in the “Platte” is unlikely to be particularly high among Stendal residents.

Apparently, the elected city councillors also see it that way, as the decision to demolish the buildings is still valid. Despite the influx of refugees, the population is declining. According to information from the town hall, building land between 500 and 600 m² is in demand for the construction of owner-occupied homes.

Demand exists for building land for owner-occupied homes

The city recently offered 20 plots for sale, of which 14 were sold fairly quickly. The price was a reasonable 13 euros per square meter. Plus development costs, the price per square meter was still less than 40 euros! A dream come true for residents of cities that are only one ICE station away: Berlin and Wolfsburg.

Will the buyer or buyers of the apartment blocks be able to take advantage of this? After all, the apartments are only 1.5 kilometers from the train station. The bus stop is right outside the front door on Hansestrasse.

Would you like to buy one of the four apartment blocks at auction?

With a little preparation, this would be possible until the 27th of the month. To do this, you would have to register for the auction. This means proving your identity, for example via the PostIdent procedure, depositing your tax identification number and providing proof of capital.

You can submit your maximum bid in writing in advance or bid by telephone. Perhaps you would like to be there live on the 27th in the Berlin Hotel “Esplanade”.

You will receive a bidding card when you register so that you can bid in person by lifting the card. Unfortunately, the auction will not be broadcast live on the internet, but I will be there and you can follow the progress on our Instagram page via “Stories”.

If you are bidding in an auction for the first time, plan for these follow-up costs of the transaction:

• 7.14 % premium for the auction house
• 1.00 % notary
• 0.50 % land registry office (Grundbuchamt)
• 5.00 % property transfer tax (Grunderwerbsteuer).

Even if you win an auction, this does not mean that you become the owner of the property. In Germany, there are generally rights of first refusal (Vorkaufsrechte). For example, for properties that are important for agriculture or nature conservation. These do not apply to blocks of flats.

But the Cathedral and Hanseatic city of Stendal also has a statutory right of first refusal. Since the city council has decided to demolish this part of the city, it is obvious that it will exercise this right. Whether it can exercise it in practice is another question. If it were to exercise it, it would have to replace the highest bidder on a one-to-one basis and whether the tight budget situation would allow this?

Wie es weitergeht, erfährst du bei uns. Schon abonniert?

Overview for you: Stendal-South in the year 2000 and 2020

Sources:
various Volksstimme, AZ-online and Wikipedia articles
Auction prospectus of the Deutschen Grundstücksauktionen AG
Rent index for Stendal 2025 from ImmobilienScout24
WBGA Stendal
Hanseatic City of Stendal