Areas to live in Darmstadt

Hello,

I'm moving to Darmstadt in October - very exciting, except my inability to speak German yet!
Anyway, I went to visit last week - not been to Germany before and I loved it. I borrowed a bike and had a good cycle around. My relocation assistant will be arranging flat viewings for me and I need to send her a list of criteria ASAP, which includes my preferred location.

I found the 'old' part of town "Johannes something" very nice. It's immediately to the west of Herrngarten. It apparently escape the bombings in the war and hence the attractive architecture. I particularly liked Viktoriastrasse as it was nice and green and flowery, and seemed quite quiet. Does anyone know of this part of town? Do they have any thoughts about living there? I've heard it's quite studenty - does it get noisy? I'm not fussed if the flat isn't uber plush and new - character and "Germaness" seems more important considering that I'm here to immerse myself in a different culture.

My priorities are sensible cycling distance to Wella (on Berliner Allee), where I'll be working. The area must be safe, quiet and reasonably green (I'm liking the proximity to Herrngarten) as I'm not really a city slicker at heart. Must be near the train station to Frankfurt and the city centre.

I have to say I was very impressed when I visited last week. Because I was taking lots of pics, I attached my mobile phone (posh, new one with a very good integral camera) to the handle bars for easy access. After an hour or so cycling around in the hot sun, I decided to lock up the bike, grab the phrase book and head into to town in search of an ice cream and toilet. Eventually found both after much wandering and worrying about my inability to speak the language. On my way back to the bike, I realised I had lost my phone! Must have left it for 45 mins locked to a subway railing in full public view, and it was still there hanging from the handle bars! There's no way that it would be still there in the UK, I reckon! Bodes well!

Anyway, any thoughts very welcome.

Roz.

Johannesviertel in Darmstadt is a nice area - close to the centre but, as you said, more picturesque than some other parts due to still having a lot of older buildings. One problem is that a lot of the large older houses are converted to flats so that you get a number of people living in a single building, but they rarely provide extra car parking space out front. It's quite close to the student areas as well, which means a slightly more livelier night life if you want it, and some interesting eating places.

If you want somewhere more unusual, there's the Hundertwasser House http://www.darmstadt.de/en/sights/hundertwasser/index.html.

Also within reasonable distance to the centre, trains and closer to Wella is Bessunger which is another old area with original houses, centred around the Orangeries gardens.

Tram and bus connections are pretty good in Darmstadt, so you cna even live furtehr out and still not have troubles getting around. A lot of people like Eberstadt, just South of Darmstadt which has nice old areas, and easy access to the start of the Odenwald and Schloss Frankenstein.

Good luck!

Well I live approimately 200m from Wella on Berliner Allee and there are a number of new flats or at least reasonably new flats being built or available for rent around that area. The Bauverein in Darmstadt are renting most of them and a company called Dreher have a number also available. Its a very quiet area, not much in the way of pubs, cafes, etc but there are some shops but then again it only takes a couple of minutes to get a bus into town (or 10 walking.) The Johannesviertal is also quite nice and you might want to look at the Martinsviertal which has reasonably priced flats for rent. BTW, when you talk about reasonably priced for Darmstadt it is a lot more than many other towns in Germany as Darmstadt quite often comes in the top 5 of most expensive places to live in, in Germany.

Are there ever appartments for rent in the Hundertwasser House? I'd love to live there.

Ah yes, I reponded to the first thread. Glad you had a nice time .

In that thread, I mentioned this area, I just could not remember its name! It's a nice area but one thing to avoid is traffic noise as there are some big roads running it. It's also got that student area thing where yiou can gfet nice pklaces next to runh down ones.

I was looking at moving in there when it was built but the one thing that put me off is that everything is rounded so you can't put furniture up against walls (although Coyote the cocktail/Mexican place in it nearly conteracted that!) The Bauverein tend own the building I believe so maybe looking here (also for other places) might help: http://www.bauvereinag.de/

It's hard to find one, but there are apartments available from time to time, sometimes via private renting from guys that live there. The apartments are quite small though and, as another poster said, nothing is square so it's a pain to put up shelves or cupboards. It's like living in a high-rise for hobbits!

Thanks, darmstadt and clickety6. I'll take a look at the bauverein site.

I live in Bessungen and it's a really nice area. The older part (by the Orangerie) is quite pretty and has the older houses, but you do pay that bit extra for it! Don't go towards Landskronstrasse tram stop as (in my opinion) it's not that nice. I have some friends who lived by the Herrengarten, and although they loved it, they had to move as they said the church bells on Sunday started really early and went on for ages!

Funnily enough one flat at the Hundertwasserhaus has just been advertised on our work site!

Flat for Rent: Waldspirale/Hundertwasserhaus 3Z 1Oct. €767,- cold

Text: 2-BEDROOM FLAT with balcony, first floor, 84m2, 15m2 terrace, access to shared gardens, large living room/lounge 26m2, separate kitchen 7.5m2, bed 1 (door to terrace) 16m2, bed2 11m2, WC/Toilet, Bathroom 7m2. AVAILABLE: Oct 1st. Rent €767,- cold. Nebenkosten ~€200, Tiefgarage Parking place €50/month (optional). INCLUDED: Kitchen, fixed cost €1250,-.
LOCATION: Burgerparkviertel, between Rhonring & Messplatz. Trams 4,5,6,7,8 2-5 mins walk. Nordbad pool/Eissporthalle 10 mins, Town center 10-15 mins, Burgerpark 5 mins. TEGUT/PLUS/ALDI/Tengelmann supermarkets 2-10 mins walk.

Contact: Jonathan Schulster. tel. 06151-20711 (privat). jschulster@gmail.com

I like that place, but I don't think I could cope with random tourists walking through my garden!

if anybody's interested, I know Jonathan and he's always seemed an OK guy so he'd probably be an OK landlord

(and no, it's not me!)

I will have to move to Darmstadt in two months, can anyone recommend me a website where I can look for flats?
Thanks in advance!

Your best bet is to look in the Darmstadter Echo and on the noticeboards at ESOC, Wella etc. We also used http://www.immobilienscout24.de which has a fantastic selection, but watch our for the provision costs...

Thank you zizy!

Darmstädter Echo is not available online, I will buy it when I come to Darmstadt for my contract (you do not find it in Berlin).

Yes it is:

http://echo-online.rheinmainclick.de/Immobilien/

Hello,

Just wanted to say thank you everyone for contributing to this thread. Looks as though I have found myself a flat in Darmstadt for my big move in October :-) Was a bit more stressful than I was hoping, but at least I have found a place and it's nice and not too expensive! It's near the theatre :-) I'm just waiting to receive the contract from my agent. Next stop Ikea.de :-)

Roz.

Have you any further hints?
I will have to find a flat for November!
Thanks in advance!

Aside from Ikea, Segmüller is the nearest German equivalent and (unlike Ikea) has a branch here in Weiterstadt. It has a lot of fans among the Brits I know here (and indeed Germans).

Hiya. Well, I'm not sure I can give you any tips, but I can tell you my experience. However, as I'm moving from the UK, can't speak any German and I was lucky enough to get a job with a really good company, I was given a relocation agent who set up flat viewings for me. Hopefully I will get the contract to sign tomorrow! Woo hoo!

Before i told my agent what I wanted, I had a "look and see" visit. This was mainly because my interview was in the UK, and I accepted the job without having seen my new office, nor even visited Germany, nevermind Darmstadt before. During this visit I borrowed a bike and cycled around the city, and spoke to people in the office that had/were renting in Darmstadt. I decided that I wanted to live in Johannesviertel or Martinsviertel as these weren't bombed in the 2nd world war so had really nice architecture and I really liked Herrngarten, and decided what my priorities were in terms of rent (5-600 euros per month) and facilities (one bedroom, unfurnished, fitted kitchen, parking, bike lock-up etc). My requirements were then submitted to the agency.

Unfortunately, in my flat viewings trip last week I was only shown 5 flats, and none of which were in the above areas, three had no kitchen and some were far too expensive. A colleague at my future office had recently relocated to Frankfurt, and the same agency had set up ~15 flat viewings for him, so it can't have been the agency being a bit rubbish. I was advised that the market in Darmstadt is quite tricky. It moves very fast and there are not many flats available. I don't think German tends to move home very often, and a lot rent rather than buy. Generally, the smaller (and hence cheaper) flats tend not have a fitted kitchen. Apparently, students in Germany tend to acquire old kitchens from their relatives (makes sense). And I was quoted about 2-3000 euros to get one of these and of course you need to have a fitted properly, but as a student, I'm going to be very poor when I start out in Germany. I don't mind sleeping on a blow up bed until I get my first pay cheque, but cooking on a camping gas burner and not having a fridge didn't excite me too much. Luckily, one of the flats did suit what I wanted, and was in a nice area. I knew I had to accept one of the flats I saw as I had no time to return to Darmstadt before I move in October, so I guess I was lucky.

Hope that helps :-)

The point about the market here is true. I know so many people trying to find places in the town centre and they are having a really really hard time. Demand is very high here and that reflects in prices of course.

It's normal - whatever status - to have to get your own kitchen.

As for the bed, don't do the blow up thing, there's no need. There's plenty of mattress outlets in central Darmstadt (Matrassen Concord etc) where you can pick up a decent one for little cash.

I'd suggest looking on the boards of places like ESOC. You can even ask them to put a notice up for you, so you can advertise for a flat/house. When looking at adverts in German, make sure you see 'Einbauküche' or 'EBK' as this means it comes with a fitted kitchen! Some landlords like you to pay a lump sum for the benefit or a little extra in your rent, but not all. We bought our kitchen from Segmuller for €4,000 but it was measured and fitted perfectly, and we went for a middle of the range instead of a cheaper one too. If you can, I'd spend a week here in a hotel so you can scope out areas you like. I'd avoid the area going out of Darmstadt towards Eberstadt (by Staples) as it's really busy and a bit industrial looking.

Muppetry, you will find that the areas you chose are very popular, which may be why you didn't find anything. If you spread out a bit and include other areas, you'll have no problem. Your budget was also quite limiting for the area too. To give you an idea, our rent is €1,400 (which includes water bills) and is a 3 bed house about 160sqm. The Germans go by sqm rather than room sizes, as you do in the UK. I found this tough at first. You say '3 bed house' in the UK and you have a rough idea, but here, the sizes measnt nothing to me!

It's ESOC people and the like that I'm about who are having difficulty and they are among the better off people here . Even they are thinking WG if they want to live in Darmstadt centre rather than a self-contained apartment.

Advice stay away from certain landlords or real estate associations of Navarro. Just a warning, the owner is Maltese and loves to trash Americans, Germans and anyone else, loves to steal money and not produce papers for deposits etc.