Does the real estate market increasingly force more families to build?

The actual house price is driven up, among other things, by the mentioned demands.

But that is not the reason why the OP feels forced to build. Because if necessary, he will build the clay hut. But he cannot get an affordable place in his city, neither for living nor for building, because: No more space in the city! Full - [I]Ende Gelände - m² all, all. [/I]

The composting toilet wasn’t so bad. The wood was still pleasant even in frost. You didn’t get the feeling of freezing onto the toilet bowl. I still remember, Grandpa replaced the composting toilet with a proper WC. In the first winter, an electric heater was added – something that hadn’t bothered anyone for centuries before.

The price of the land makes quite a difference. If I take the same budget we have (Karsten could have cut 100,000 euros there) and build with it in big cities or their surrounding areas, it would have been enough for a Flair 113 or 125 with a carport.

Demands: Yes, they are there. Walk-in closet, children’s bathroom, lift-slide door, extra gamer-hangout-room, possibly space (when I look around and see the houses from the 60s/70s/80s here, people build smaller nowadays).

Country: Living there isn’t so bad. Why it is so unattractive, I have no idea. Even from my brother-in-law, there’s nothing really constructive – except that it’s terrible.

Who doesn’t want to build doesn’t have to build and shouldn’t either.
Repayment rate + additional costs + reserves, anyone who puts that into rent is in the range of so-called luxury apartments.

City and countryside. Why does everyone want to move to Ham or at least KI and HL, to Katja in L, etc. There is already work here in rural areas, but the range of well-paid professions is narrow, a few civil servant positions at schools or authorities, some jobs for medical professionals, otherwise only crafts or tourism-related services. Nothing in IT, nothing for economists, probably some for a civil engineer, also for an architect, but no industrial jobs at all. In the real countryside, that is outside the small towns in the villages, we then encounter aging and genuine rural exodus; the farmer with 1,000 ha only needs one or two workers, the agricultural machinery mechanic a few technicians, otherwise it’s just the fertilizer dealer and that’s it. Now it has been waited too long to change something here. I think some software or media people could by now also live and work rurally, if only there were a 100,000 connection. Only the municipalities often fail to achieve the required 60% connection rate with the aging remaining population and the low educational level of the remaining young people; digitalization fails, grandma doesn’t need it, Hannes on the combine harvester doesn’t need it either. And the mayor of the village is desperate because his new development area is not progressing and the daycare center is at risk. K.

New new new. Ok I also have new but only a semi-detached house with 120 sqm that fit our price range. Could have had a 220 sqm older bunker though. Goes away here for peanuts and eggs. Then the big family buys it and makes it nice, I have to admit. But for us it was not an option, 2 cars and for 20 km further away having to change train or bus again too inflexible. So here you have the dependencies, time, money, equipment

You can choose what you want, but in Germany people are used to reaching high up on the shelf and calling that the minimum standard.

"Minimum standard" maybe not, but when building new in 2019, it simply makes little sense to assemble it to the technical level of 2010. Everything that is considered a luxury today will at least be an expected minimum standard in 10 to 15 years. Or would anyone still want to do without underfloor heating today? That was still the exception in 2005. I don't need smart home stuff and the like either, but the trend is clearly going that way. Those who don't keep up will have to live with loss of value later or retrofit expensively.

I don't necessarily see it that way. What I didn't pay for before doesn't mean a loss in value afterward.

For example, today I would not be willing to pay any added value for home automation, underfloor heating, heat pump, etc. when buying a house...