What’s new in Berlin
Events in June
- ILA air show (June 10-14)
- Start of the football World Cup (June 11)
- Pankow Art Festival (June 13-14)
- Fête de la musique (June 21)
- Kreuzberg Festival (June 26-28)
More Bürgeramt appointments
After almost ten years, the Berlin government has fulfilled a long-standing election promise: you can easily get a Bürgeramt appointment within two weeks. My Anmeldung appointment finder is finally useless!
This major improvement is attributed to a new team of mobile Bürgeramt employees. They work wherever they are needed, filling staffing gaps in different Bürgerämter.
Although changing your address by hand-delivering a paper form still feels anachronistic, at least getting the appointment is easy.
Higher rents
The Mietspiegel was adjusted. The median rent was raised from €7.21 in 2024 to €7.71 in 2026, a 7% increase.1 This number is used as a basis for rent controls. This number includes a lot of old leases, so it does not reflect the prices of available apartments. My Berlin rent map gives you more realistic numbers.
How to find an apartment in Berlin
What’s new in Germany
New Deutsche Bahn tickets
The Deutsche Bahn is introducing a €99 Family Ticket. It covers a two-way long-distance train trip for up to 5 family members. It will be available from mid-June until the end of summer.
Since May, they also sell €6.99 last-minute intercity tickets when you book during the weekend for the next week.
End of the Tankrabatt
The Tankrabatt ends on June 30, which means higher gas prices in July.1
On my radar
These are changes that are not yet set in stone, but worth keeping an eye on:
- Higher taxes, lower benefits
The German government is floating 13-hour work days, delayed retirement, more expensive health insurance, higher taxes for childless adults, parental allowance cuts, and so on. - Rent register
Berlin wants to build a rent register. Making rents more transparent would help tenants fight against illegally high rents.
What’s new on All About Berlin
Last week, I wrote about how AI is killing All About Berlin. The post has received an outpour of support and gratitude, and was picked up by The Telegraph, Forbes, Deutschlandfunk and a few other publications.
All About Berlin is not going anywhere, nor is anything getting paywalled, but I must postpone work on new guides until I fix this.
Immigration office wait times
I have redesigned the immigration office wait times page with help from my friend Lucy Hellawell. There is now a graph of wait times.
I have also learned that the Berlin immigration office uses my data, as they don’t collect their own.
What I learned this month
My N26 Metal account comes with trip cancellation insurance. I caught a flu before a flight and had to cancel my trip. I’m happy to report that the insurance worked, but it was a tedious bureaucratic hassle, and I only got my half of the trip refunded, despite paying for two people.
Interesting links
- Human-curated maps of Berlin:
- Germany is over – Kurzgesagt
- In case you missed it: how to deal with hay fever