KfW BEG funding stopped 261, 262, 263, 264, 461, 463, 464

To increase the home ownership rate, it probably helps more to lower real estate prices, e.g. by making less expensive regulations and designating more building land. Of course, this conflicts with other goals (nature conservation, ...)

That also doesn't help, because we live in a market economy. The market regulates the prices. A system we are proud of. When thinking of a market economy, everyone thinks of the great effect that an oversupply lowers prices, as all producing companies compete. However, the opposite occurs in the case of scarcity: prices are raised until demand falls to a level the market can serve. And this is the case I see in the real estate market. Too little supply, too few plots, shortage of craftsmen, etc. So any kind of subsidy will automatically result 1:1 in higher costs. So lowering requirements will also not reduce the house price.

otherwise directly via the grant portal

What do I already need to have there? Or just raise my hand first and say I would like to?

We had a net income of €5000 in 2020 and our taxable income according to the tax return was €80,000. That means we are still far from the €105,000 that we are allowed for child construction allowance with 2 children. And unbelievably, we manage to build in the Munich area with that. Even with a basement...

Do or did you manage? Serious question, because €5k net roughly corresponds to a maximum loan of €500k-600k, and even the cheapest (and I mean truly "cheapest") prefabricated house providers don’t build a house under €300k, plus basement and additional construction costs: So either building plots near Munich are given away or there is corresponding equity to top up, but a pure €5000 net income alone, according to my current research (we want to build), is not sufficient – and woe betide if the plot is not flat!

That also doesn't help, because we live in a market economy. The market regulates prices. A system we are proud of. When thinking of a market economy, everyone thinks of the great effect that an oversupply lowers prices because all producing companies compete. But the opposite happens in case of scarcity: prices are raised until demand falls to a level that the market can serve. And I see this case in the real estate market. Too little supply, too few plots of land, shortage of skilled tradespeople, etc. So any kind of subsidy will automatically end up 1:1 in higher costs. So lowering requirements will also not reduce the house price.

Yes and no. Basically, there are two effects at work here. On the one hand, regulations restrict competition at the technology level. Heating is a good example. With the regulation that it must be "renewable" everywhere, cheap oil and gas heating systems are excluded. Instead of radiators, floor heating is now required for heat pumps. On the other hand, some undesirable technologies simply require fewer workers or less qualified workers. Doing work yourself has become significantly harder today due to the more complex building technology. I am not only thinking about single-family home construction here. One problem in residential construction is parking spaces. Most of the time they are then buried underground (underground garage = expensive), and since it cannot be multi-story (= even more expensive), double parkers are installed, which are cumbersome to use and expensive to maintain. It becomes an even bigger problem when, as here, a raised ground floor is built. It would have been much smarter to build the ground floor as the parking level and raise the house by one floor. However, this is usually not permitted. But basically, I agree with you. Just lowering requirements will not solve the problems. One also has to tackle the issue of land (I really sympathize with people who own land for 400+ €/sqm) and the shortage of skilled tradespeople caused by overly rigid academic requirements.

What do I already need for that? Or first just raise my hand and say I would like to?

I can't tell you, I did it through the bank. I guess they also need the confirmation of the application (BZA) ID. But it's definitely written somewhere here in the forum or elsewhere to read up on.

I have to come back to January 24th as the deadline for submitting applications: From when exactly was it no longer possible to submit an application? Only on January 23rd or was it still possible on January 24th? Our energy consultant only sent his report with the ID on the late afternoon of January 24th; perhaps one can argue that the invoice is not paid because different conditions were assumed.