Housing

Wherever you prefer to live it is advisable to find a place close to a public transport access. This is very convenient in everyday life and can save you a lot of time.

If you are interested in residential accommodation, the Berliner Studierendenwerk offers a number of different options like single rooms, apartments or a shared flat. Rent is between €150 and €300. A lot of rooms are furnished but you might need your own bedding and kitchen ware. Unfortunately, the Studentenwerk is not able to satisfy all requests from incoming students, therefore you are urgently advised to consider other alternatives in the rather likely case that you will not get a place in a student dormitory.

Info-Point of the Studentenwerk (near to TU main building, U2 Ernst-Reuter-Platz, S Tiergarten):

Hardenbergstr. 34, 10623 Berlin (Mon-Fri 8 a.m. - 6 p.m.)

Tel.: +49 [0]30) 9 39 39-70
E-Mail: infopoint@studentenwerk-berlin.de

Info-Point of the Studentenwerk (near to HU main building, 2 subway stops from the BCCN - U6 Französische Straße):

Behrenstraße 40-41, 10117 Berlin (Mon-Wed 8 a.m. - 4 p.m.; Thu 9 a.m. - 6 p.m.; Fri 8 a.m. - 3 p.m.)

You can also choose to find a room or flat privately. The prices very much depend on the neighborhood and on the type of apartment/building, the minimal monthly rate for a room is about 250 euro (~400-600 euro for a flat) all inclusive. However, in order to find the right place for yourself, you need to know the city a bit and you need time to search. If you choose this option there are several possibilities: you can share a flat with other people (in German called ‘Wohngemeinschaft - WG’), this would correspond to a ‘WG-Zimmer’. You can live in an apartment of your own; this would be e.g. ‘1-Zimmer-Wohnung’ (prices starting from about 450 euro/month all inclusive). Both of these possibilities are also available for certain periods of time because residents leave the city temporarily (anything between a month and 1 year), want to keep their room/flat but don’t want to pay the rent while they are away. Such housing is offered in magazines Exberliner (in English), Zitty (in German), TIP (in German), both on the respective web pages and in the printed version. Additionally, there is the Zweite Hand (in German), and the newspapers Berliner Morgenpost (in German), and Tagesspiegel (in German), the respective printed versions of which come out on Saturdays. More web links for flat and room search:

Immobilienscout (DE)
wg-gesucht.de (EN, DE)
Crocodilian (EN)
City Wohnen (EN)
WG Company (EN)
zwischenmiete.de (DE)
studentenwg.de (DE)
Information from the TU Berlin (EN)

Usually you will have to deposit a bond with your landlord. In most cases this is between 2 and 3 times your monthly rent. The money is returned to you when you leave the contract together with the interest accumulated in the meantime. If the flat needs to be renovated after you leave it, sometimes part of the bond is kept by the landlord for covering the respective costs.

In addition to your monthly rent you may have extra costs for things like electricity, gas or Internet/telephone. Depending on the type of heating you have, electricity or gas can be quite a substantial amount. Concerning heating you should be aware that there are still a number of flats within Berlin which are heated with coal. While this is really comfortable warmth once there is warmth, it is a lot of work to get the warmth. The advantage of such flats is that they come at a low price (coal heating is described as "Ofenheizung" in German ads).

You might want to have a telephone line and Internet at home. The main provider within Germany is still the ‘Deutsche Telekom’ but other providers, e.g. 1und1,  Alice, O2, Vodafone, Telecolumbus, Debitel etc., have entered the market as well. The different companies differ in their pricing and their services. Depending on how much you speak on the phone or want to use the web at home it might be worthwhile checking different options. A telephone line by the ‘Deutsche Telekom’ has the advantage that you can use different pre-dialers offering cheap rates e.g. for calling abroad. However, in the Skype era it is often redundant.