Inexpensive rooms from student unions ensure that many students survive in the financially lean years. But the energy crisis and inflation do not stop at the doors of the dormitories.
Stuttgart/Mannheim (dpa/lsw) – For many students in the southwest, rents in dormitories will increase in the new year. “We cannot avoid adjusting the ancillary costs included in our rents as of January 1, 2023,” said the Stuttgart student union. The increases of an average of 13 percent in the state capital affect all new contracts. Mannheim is also increasing rents for newcomers. In Freiburg, Karlsruhe and Heidelberg, on the other hand, long-term residents are also affected.
The reasons are obvious: the general price increases have also left their mark on the student unions. They have to spend more money on energy, services and goods. In Freiburg, for example, the electricity and heating costs for a place to live have doubled since 2021. Here, at the beginning of 2023, all total rents will increase by 25 euros. A spokeswoman emphasized that she had never experienced anything like this. In previous years, rents had increased only in small increments of usually six euros.
An exception is Tübingen: The student union there is currently keeping the rents for students stable. “We deliberately decided against a rent increase,” said a spokesman. However, we continue to monitor the situation.
The student unions surveyed did not register any reactions from the students. The spokeswoman for the plant in Freiburg suspected that this could be due to the fact that the rents for dormitories are much cheaper than on the rest of the market, despite the increases.
