According to the Building and Financing Info Service of the LBS Landesbausparkassen, around 40 percent of Germany's entire housing stock was built before the introduction of the first Thermal Insulation Ordinance in 1977. A large proportion of properties built in the decades after the war, between 1949 and 1978, have major deficiencies and weak points in terms of energy efficiency and require extensive modernization measures.
Calculations by the German Federal Ministry of Economics show that the average energy consumption of existing properties from this period is around 208 kilowatt hours per square meter (kWh/sqm). In contrast, properties built in accordance with the guidelines from the 2009 Energy Saving Ordinance consume around 50 kWh/sqm. Residential buildings from the 1950s and 1960s in particular, the so-called post-war properties, have a high energy refurbishment requirement.
Due to material scarcity and thriftiness in the post-war period, these houses do not have adequate sound and heat insulation. Even though many of the individual stoves used at the time were replaced over time by central heating systems, these often do not meet today's energy standards. In the 1970s, industrial construction and construction with concrete gained great importance. Buyers of residential properties from the 1970s should therefore have the construction condition of these properties checked for thermal bridges, moisture damage, and pollutants that may have resulted from the use of harmful materials such as asbestos or formaldehyde.
Source: LBS
© photodune.net
