Berlin Apartments

April 5, 2006 8:21 AM

I am looking to sublet or rent an apartment in Berlin for the summer or possibly longer. Where can I find listings on the net aside from Craigslist?

I don't speak German. I checked google but most of the sites that turn up are glass and mirrors furnished places aimed at executive types. Any ideas?

posted by dydecker to home & garden (11 comments total)

Curious... was is the rent on an apartment in Berlin, in U.S. dollars, please?
posted by Witty at 9:07 AM on April 5, 2006

ack... should be, WHAT is the rent. Sorry, I'm having a bad day in this department.
posted by Witty at 9:09 AM on April 5, 2006

It will be damn hard without speaking German, but you could check out some of Berlin's local publications. You could translate the pages with Google, but you still won't understand the ads very well, since they're full of abbreviations:

Zitty's classifieds - Look under "Wohnungen"

TIP's housing classifieds

Some terminology that might help:

Zi or Zimmer - bedrooms (2 Zi. means 2 bedroom).

U-Bhf - subway station

zw. - "between"

Küche - kitchen

ruhig - quiet

hübsch - cute

möbliert - furnished

Hope this helps!
posted by TunnelArmr at 9:11 AM on April 5, 2006

TunnelArmr, thank you.

Witty, my friend in Berlin is paying 250 Euros a month for a room approx 20m2 in a two-bedroom apartment in Prenzlauerberg.
posted by dydecker at 9:53 AM on April 5, 2006

www.mitwohnzentrale.de
it's in German, but if you click on the British flag on top of the site it changes to half English.
posted by ollsen at 9:58 AM on April 5, 2006

Oh, I guess 250 euros is about US$300.
posted by dydecker at 10:00 AM on April 5, 2006

http://berlin.kijiji.de/f-Immobilien-Zwischenmiete-W0QQCatIdZ1003

but it's only in German
posted by ollsen at 10:02 AM on April 5, 2006

cheers, ollsen!
posted by dydecker at 12:06 PM on April 5, 2006

University students are always wanting to sublet their places during the summer. I'd check listings at the university, or send an email to someone who distributes email to various faculty lists. Our grad students' association newsletter always has stuff like this posted in it.
posted by jimmythefish at 12:20 PM on April 5, 2006

Try www.zwischenmiete.de or www.studenten-wg.de (they are drawing their results from the same database, so choose the one whose design you like better; both sites in German).

And adding onto the terminology:
WG (Wohngemeinschaft): shared flat (not shared rooms)
Wohungsmarkt: flat/room listings
Angebote: flats/rooms to let
Miete: rent
Nebenkosten: additional costs (water, electricity, in some cases phone and internet).

And if you're stumbling across other unfamiliar German words, dict.leo.org is your friend.
posted by insouciant at 12:35 PM on April 5, 2006

By the way - these sites are how I found my current place in Berlin. Rent (everything included) is about 200USD.
posted by insouciant at 12:38 PM on April 5, 2006