German building minister: apartments could be built above supermarkets

She argues that this could help ease the housing shortage in cities while providing retailers with additional rental income, Lebensmittelpraxis reports.

The idea is not without precedent: in 2024, Aldi Süd developed a mixed-use property in Waldbronn, near Karlsruhe, which combines retail spaces with residential units. Created in cooperation with the local municipality, the development includes around 115 apartments, roughly 20% of which are designated as socially subsidized housing.

Speaking on the Politico Berlin Playbook podcast, Hubertz noted that most supermarkets and their parking lots occupy large urban areas, while available plots for new housing remain scarce. She also proposed converting unused commercial and industrial buildings into residential spaces and adding extra floors to existing terraced houses in Berlin.

A 2019 study estimated that such measures – including rooftop extensions, conversions and building over parking lots – could create up to 1.2 million new apartments across Germany. However, architects warn that many single-storey supermarkets are structurally unsuitable for extensions, meaning entirely new buildings would be required in some cases.