House purchase single-family house built in 77 how to assess?

Just show interest to the real estate agents. We got many offers through interest lists. None of them were on the internet.

Interesting that it worked for you. With us, the agents did put us on the list, but no agent within a 20km radius ever called us... Funny enough, only now has an agent called for the first time to ask if we are still looking. We have been on their list for 2 years. I think that also illustrates the current situation..

Hello, I can well understand your situation. We have also been looking for an existing property to buy for about 2 years. My side of the family lives and resides here, all active in clubs, in my grandma’s store everyone from our village and the surrounding communities used to shop. My significant other is now even the chairman of a local sports club. I have asked and requested our regular baker, butcher, and also the hairdresser to keep an eye out.
Still, we are completely unsuccessful, the real estate agent "who has us on his list" offered the house twice to someone else, and directly from private owners the (so far only three (!)) houses offered were unfortunately not for us, because too small, too big, too cold (north slope) and some houses were more like investment properties.
One more note, I don’t know how it looks in your village, but here in the top locations (south slope with a nice view of the village center) many seniors over 80/90 live, in the neighboring village it looks the same. It’s only a matter of time until the properties become available. Maybe you should get in touch with the neighbors here, often they bring groceries or help in the garden and know if there are children and whether they would move back or not..
We are now planning a new build instead of an existing property.

I thank you all once again for the many contributions, which certainly also provide valuable impulses!

As mentioned - we have been searching for nearly 5, almost 6 years now, 4 of those years looking to buy, and of course have been on every realtor's list within a 20km radius for years (example quote: "Mr. X, we have 3500 search orders in the database, I can’t search personally for you as well"). We are also on the lists for new building areas in the municipalities (at the beginning we were so inexperienced that we believed we could get a building plot as someone not directly in the bloodline of the village :-D)
The club tip can work, yes. But even for a local born there, it’s many times more difficult.

Anyone who thinks it’s half as difficult is entitled to that opinion. But it is impossible to generalize this view to every place and every area of this country. That is just as presumptuous as it is impossible.

I think the crux is also your demand not to drive 10km for shopping. That is really not an enormous distance. When we had the first house, we also had to extend our commuting time to work (back then still office) from 20 to 30 minutes because nothing was affordable within a 20-minute radius. The route was then so easy to drive that it could be done in 25 minutes. In return, we built much more cheaply.

Where does your desire to really stay in such an immediate vicinity come from, that a 10km radius increase seems too much? If you are not active in clubs / sports groups etc. anyway, what draws you so irresistibly to the town? As someone who once built in a community of 12,000 inhabitants and is currently building in a community with <2000 inhabitants - my experience says that both are patches of nowhere. ;)

The problem is the small search radius. Many who have built their dream house here in the forum were also not able to realize this in their hometown but moved 30 km away. If you are not willing to do that, you will hardly find anything even with a better market situation. Because you have to be locally flexible, and if you do not accept 30-40 minutes to work (which I also commute), then you simply cannot build a house. And on the topic of a small town. What do you imagine is so bad about a small town? You can live wonderfully here in beautiful nature without noise. Of course, your car is your constant companion in a town with <2000 inhabitants, but in the larger neighboring town with over 10,000 inhabitants, you also always need a car if you do not live in the very city center. Since the new development areas are also >1 km away from infrastructure with supermarkets/restaurants/hardware stores/hairdressers. If you live in a townhouse in the big city on the tram line, you don't need a car. In the countryside, even in small towns, you always do. Alone because your son’s friend then lives at the other end of town and the buses do not run regularly.

Well, 10 km one way is already 20 km round trip. You don’t bike that just to quickly get some bread rolls anymore. Then you either drive a car for every little thing or have to plan really well and do weekly shopping and eat pre-baked bread rolls. So I can understand the expectation of not being more than 10 (or actually 5) km away from shopping facilities. But overall, I would also increase the search radius from the desired location.