After the Move: Anmeldung, Electricity, Gas & Internet | Everyone Is Moving To Berlin

Show Notes

Urban Sports Club
How to move into an apartment in Germany (All About Berlin)
How do electric bills work in Germany? (All About Berlin)
Verivox
Check24
Fiber internet via PYUR

Transcript

Manuel:
[0:08] Hello, everyone, it's Manuel. And this is, Everyone Is Moving to Berlin. And on this episode I would like to talk to you about the things that you have to do after the move, after you find an apartment in Berlin: the Anmeldung, getting electricity, gas and internet. But before I do, I wanted to explain why I'm all by myself in this episode, and reflect a little bit about how it's been going, and what this show is and wants to be, and our plans, and a little bit of a behind-the-scenes. Because Jae and I actually sat together and reflected, and we are eight months into this show. We started eight months ago and we have recorded 17 episodes, this is number 18. And we have around a thousand listeners, and we hear from you guys, this is probably our main driver.

[1:10] The main reason we enjoy doing this show and recording this show is that quite a few of you have written in and given us feedback, and shared ideas, and shared words of encouragement. And that's really nice. We've been recording - or trying to record and publish - fortnightly, so every two weeks so far, and we sat down and we thought about where we want to go with this show and what we want it to be. And we decided that we want to go to a weekly rhythm, even though we have already, with the fortnightly schedule, faced a lot of time constraints and scheduling constraints because we both have busy lives and other jobs, and things we do, and projects, and so on and so on. But a biweekly or fortnightly podcast just doesn't really feel right to me. It just feels like, I don't know, two weeks is a long time to pass for an episode to go by.

[2:11] And we ... I mean, this show isn't making us any money really, or isn't really ... We don't have ambitions to turn this into a huge show or anything. But we thought: Hey, it would be nice to reach twice as many people eight months from now. And going weekly might help with that. And we also just have a lot of ideas for topics and a lot of things we want to share and get out. So we're going to weekly, but because of all the time constraints and scheduling constraints and things we have to deal with, we are basically starting with this little cheat, where every second episode will just be one of us talking, and we will just share whatever's on our mind, and it won't be in the form of a conversation. So feel free to skip these episodes if that seems boring to you, or if me speaking all by myself feels a little awkward to you. I understand.

[3:08] And then we also wanted to say thank you. Thank you to all of you who have written in with those kind words and feedback, pieces of feedback and suggestions, and to everybody who has bought us a coffee, so to speak, and to Temidayo, specifically, a listener who started proofreading our transcripts. If you didn't know, we have these automated transcripts on our website. And Temidayo started correcting those, which just helps with accessibility, so people who aren't able to listen for whatever reason can read those transcripts. And I like this idea that this show is almost kind of like a community project. So if you want to do any of these things, you can go to everyone.berlin/contribute. If you want to help us reach our goal of reaching more people, you can leave a rating, or even better, a written review on Apple Podcasts or on Spotify - I think you can also rate shows now, I'm not sure - and recommend this show to anyone who you think it might be helpful to, either in person or, if you're on any groups, Facebook groups, Reddit groups, whatever it is is where people are sharing information about moving to Berlin, you can share this.

[4:40] And then lastly, if you have an idea for a topic, or you have some expertise and there's something that you found out that you think: Hey, this could be interesting to the listeners of this show, then please, please, please write in. A few people have done so already. A few have been on the show already, and we're scheduling more of these guest interview shows. And I like this idea that, basically, it's not just us talking, blabbing, sharing our sometimes very random thoughts, but that we're basically all in this together, and we're just trying to help each other out and sharing the things that you need to know when you move here.

Follow-Up

[5:26] Okay. Next, we have some follow-up, some emails that I thought were really great. The first one was from Susan, who wrote in regarding our episode about grocery stores and grocery shopping, and I'm just going to read this email because I think it's hilarious.

[5:46] "Hi, Manuel and Jae. It was fun listening to your podcast about grocery shopping in Berlin as I'm a professional Hausfrau who has been honing the skill of shopping for the past two years. Things you missed about grocery shopping: Penny is the discount store for Rewe, same company or group, so yeah, no need to shop at Penny because you get the same at Rewe. Lidl and Kaufland are both a part of Schwarz Gruppe. So the same parent company. Lidl differentiates from the other discount stores by having a stellar products department. You see this right away walking in. Netto Marken-Discount, red-and yellow brand mark, is the discount store for Edeka. Netto, black, Scotty-dog mark, is a Danish discount store. Norma, a lesser-seen discount store is noteworthy for its wine selection - good wines, nothing else to see here. Aldi Nord owners also own Trader Joe's in USA. Why can't they bring TJ products here? DM and Rossman are like Walgreens and CVS without the prescription drugs, but DM is the Target version, and Rossman is the Walmart version. You can walk into a DM and walk out with ten things you didn't need or know you were going to buy, like Target. And with Rossman you find what you need and get out as fast as you can, like Walmart. I would add Woolworths as the other half of Walmart, for things you can find at Rossman. There's no other half of Target, and that is so very sad. So here's what you maybe did or didn't know, which boils down to: Try the wines from Norma!"

[7:25] Thank you so much for that hilarious discussion of the different discount stores and supermarkets, Susan. And then Louis wrote in, regarding our Winter Is Coming episode, and he writes: "I moved to Berlin two years ago, right before the first lockdown. It was hard. It took me almost two years, but I'm finally slowly feeling at home in Berlin - you know, being new in a big city plus the pandemic. Anyways, regarding the winter in Berlin, yes, I have also heard the horror stories about it. But I think there's something that a lot of people tend to forget during the cold months: To move. I'm a very active person and love to go to the gym, run bike, etc. I always tell my friends that movement or working out really helps against the winter blues. I recently got a sport membership where you can practice a lot of different sports. I've already been in the bouldering halls, spinning, boxing and swimming, and I love it. I think people should move more. Just ignore the inner lazy saboteur and go sweat a little bit. Do so two to three times a week and the winter won't be as bad as people say. Also, maybe if you are on drugs, we all know that the downer after the high can be pretty bad."

[8:38] Thank you, Louis. I completely agree. It's obviously all about fighting the inner pig dog, as we say in German, der innere Schweinehund, and to even just get up and go outside do those things! But I completely agree that it's very easy, especially when it's dark and gray, and it's dark before you go to work, and it's dark when you come back from work, and it's raining and it's grey, and you just want to snuggle up on the couch, and you don't think that you need to go and work out. But then, if you do, it makes all the difference. I've heard of these apps or services where you get to use kind of gyms and clubs and stuff all over the city. I think one of them is called Urban Sports Club. I looked into the pricing and it didn't quite make sense to me personally because I think they're quite expensive, and they really kind of pay off if you really want to go every single day almost, or five times a week, and you want to try lots and lots of different things. I'm a bit more boring. I go and run a little bit, and recently I've picked up swimming, but I always go to the same swimming pool. So it's not really for me. But I agree that if you're new here and you just want to try things, and try different groups and clubs and gyms, then trying a membership like that could be a great idea.

After the Move: Anmeldung

[10:13] Okay. So now onto our main topic, which is the things that you need to do after the move. It's a little bit boring maybe, but I've had this on the list of topics since we started this show, and it's basically still in this category of basic kind of things that you need to know when you move here. You know, the idea - I think I mentioned this in the beginning - but the idea for this show for me was really, I have had friends, international friends, acquaintances, move to Berlin and then when they get here, I met them and they started asking questions and I started giving them advice about the things they needed to do and how to approach them and how to do them. And the idea for this show is to do this in the form of a podcast, but obviously the show is becoming much more than that. We're not just giving advice or sharing how-to's, and in many ways this is done much better in written form.

[11:21] And I will actually once again recommend a website called, allaboutberlin.com, which is done by a single person who, I don't know, seems to have dedicated his life to writing down all the information that you need to know when you come to Berlin. And so we're not trying to replicate that, but we're finding a balance between kind of telling you between friends, like, this is the information you need to know or this is the information you need to at least look up, and then random kind of topics that are on our mind, interviews with people who have made a life here. Kind of exploring the types of people who are in Berlin now, and what kinds of lives you could lead in Berlin. So all of that is to say this is a mini topic, where I wanted to get this off my chest because it would feel incomplete to not even mention these things. But yeah, most episodes, as you've already noticed, aren't all that information-driven, if any of that makes sense.

[12:33] Anyway, so you've moved to Berlin - or you're going to move to Berlin - and then you found the apartment, we made a whole episode about that. Probably one of the most difficult parts of moving here is finding a place to live. But let's say you've found that place. What do you do next? And I think the main four things that you need to deal with are the Anmeldung, the registration, electricity, gas and internet. So the Anmeldung: I will just put a link in the show notes to allaboutberlin.com.

[13:07] How to register an address in Berlin: it is something that is very important because you legally need to register when you move to Berlin, and only once you've done so, do you get a certificate, Anmeldung Bestätigung, which you actually need to do many other things. At the same time, it's often quite tricky, number one, because it's really hard to get an appointment to do this Anmeldung You could try going without an appointment. And actually apparently there will be a way to do this online, pretty soon, so hopefully the whole appointment saga will not be a problem anymore. The other problem is that many people, when they first move here, move to either a shared place, or they sublet a place. And many times the ... not the landlord but the person they're renting the place from, will tell them, "You can't register here."

[14:08] And I think the main reason why that happens is because that person doesn't actually have the permission from the actual landlord to sublet the place, and they don't want the landlord to know that you're living there. And so they don't want you to register or put your address on the mailbox or on the bell. And so you're living there, kind of semi-illegally. Not great. I know many people then end up registering at friends' places and putting their name on the mailbox there for a few months. It's not a great system, but yeah, basically you need to figure out what can work for you according to this article - I didn't know this was the case, but according to this article, if you don't register or if you can't register your address, you can still get a tax ID, and that's the requirement to get a job, like your employer will need your tax ID. You get that automatically once you register, but if you don't register, you can go to the Finanzamt and ask for one, and they'll send you one, regardless. So that's good to know.

[15:21] So the Anmeldung, yeah, I would recommend dealing with it as soon as possible. If you already know that you'll move here and you already have a place, I would just try to get an appointment even before you come here. If you're already here, then still try to get an appointment, or go there without an appointment. Or try to do it online, if that's possible by the time that you listen to this, and if your German isn't that great yet, try to bring a native speaker. Because, I mean, the Anmeldung is really straightforward, but it's in these kind of office situations, I found that it's always good to have someone who has done it before and speaks German, and if there's any issues, can kind of argue for you and make sure that everything goes smoothly.

After The Move: Gas

[16:13] So then, Gas and Heating, obviously a huge topic right now with the Russian war against Ukraine, and the resulting explosion in gas prices and all of that. We're not going to go into these kind of current events here, I think. But most apartments in Berlin - and I think in Germany - are heated by gas still, unfortunately. And there's two ways this can go. Most people that I know, pay their gas bill through their landlord as part of the Warmmiete. So we talked about this before. There's Kaltmiete and Warmmiete. Basically, the Kaltmiete is just the actual rent that you pay to your landlord. And then the Warmmiete is that, plus a few other things that you need to pay your landlord. And then all of that together is the Warmmiete, that's the the amount of money you actually need to transfer each month. And the Warmmiete, for everybody, includes things that are related to the building. So there's like an insurance for the building, and the garbage disposal services, and the Hausmeister, like the guy who takes care of the building, the cleaning of the corridor and the building, kind of all of these ... electricity in the corridor, like all of the things that are shared among all the neighbors, all of that is part of the Nebenkosten.

[17:48] But then for most people, I think it also includes the heating. So that's also why it's called the Warmmiete, because it is the Miete, the rent, including the heating, so that your place is warm. I never really understood this until recently, because most of the places I've lived at, including my apartment now, I had to get my own gas contract. So this is also possible. So in my apartment, there's like a gas boiler thing in the kitchen, which heats the water for my water and also for my heaters. And I have a little gas counter in my apartment's corridor. And so I basically take care of my own gas supply, in the sense that I had to sign up for a gas provider who I am paying to, for the gas that I consume. Apparently, this is less common, but if that is the case for you, then you also need to sign up for your own gas contract.

[19:08] And yeah, if you're not sure which one it is, I would confirm with your landlord, like: Is the gas part of your Warmmiete, is this handled through them and you're paying at the end of the year? So the way it works is that it's all just an estimation, right? So if your Kaltmiete is, let's say €600 and your Warmmiete is €750, then first of all, you got pretty lucky, probably, in terms of the overall rent! And secondly, the €150, the difference between €600 and €750, that is just an estimation of what the landlord will pay for the insurance and all of that, and the heating or the gas. And then at the end of one year - actually a few months after the year ends, I think, usually in July or August or September - you get the kind of bill or statement of the previous calendar year, and it will show you exactly what the landlord had to pay for all of these things.

[20:17] And then, depending on how it went, you - if you're really lucky - you get some money back, or you have to pay them, do a one time transfer for that year to make up for the difference. And obviously right now with the exploding gas prices, the tricky thing is that many people ... Like the gas prices are going up a lot, but people don't see it right away on their bills because this will only ... like you're only paying this estimate right now and then a year from now, you might have to pay a big difference. Anyway, that's how it works. So confirm if it's part of your of your Warmmiete or if you have to deal with it yourself. And if you do, then go to a website that compares contracts. So there's two famous ones, Verivox and CHECK24. I will put both of them in the show notes.

[21:22] And these are essentially search engines for gas, and also internet, and electricity contracts, where you kind of enter where you live and an estimation of how much you will use per year. And then they will show you all of the different companies you can sign up with. They make their money because it's basically an affiliate link, and then if you sign up through them they get a kickback from the provider. And you have to be careful, because the prices that they show you, usually include kind of a bonus for new customers, and usually it'll be much cheaper in the first year, and then if you don't cancel or you forget to cancel, then it gets quite a lot more expensive. So yeah, make sure you actually look at the pricing, not just in the first 12 months, but overall. And if you're the kind of person who's not going to set a reminder to change the contract after 12 months - which is relatively easy, by the way, you could do this - but if you don't think you would do this, then maybe don't pick the top one that's the cheapest right now, but pick the cheapest that's going to be cheapest in the long run. And you can also make sure you get kind of sustainable gas, whatever that is supposed to mean, Ökogas.

[22:49] But yeah, I would definitely use one of these websites. If you don't do any of this, if you kind of just ignore it, you will still have gas, you will still have heating, because with both electricity and gas, we have a law that makes sure that when you move into a new place, you have gas and internet, and it's called Grundversorgung. So you can move in, and then you can deal with it ... I think you have, like, three months to get a contract, and you can get the contract so it applies from the moment you moved in retrospectively, basically. If you don't do it at all, then you will stay with the standard gas provider, which is GASAG in Berlin, and they will just provide you with gas and send you the bill, and usually that will be more expensive than if you look for a provider and sign up for it manually. Electricity is basically the exact same thing.

After the Move: Electricity

[23:50] Electricity is basically the exact same thing. Everything that I just said about gas is also true for electricity, except that this will never be paid by your landlord. This is always something that is is done individually on a per-apartment basis. So you want to go to one of these two websites as well, estimate how much electricity you're going to use, and find an electricity provider. And again, if you don't deal with this, then you will just be a customer of the Grundversorger, which in Berlin is Vattenfall. And this, as well, will be more expensive than if you actually look for one and sign up for one, and then potentially, change 12 months later. And there, too, you have the possibility to look for green electricity, sustainable electricity that comes from renewable energies. If you look into this a little bit more, then you will find out that most of them aren't actually sustainable! Like there's a lot of behind-the-scenes dealing with certificates and blah, blah, blah, where they're actually importing ... actually it's a complicated topic. I would still always click that option because it's better to do so than not, I think. But it's not as green, necessarily, as they make you think it is. But yeah, deal with the electricity. Don't just stay with the Grundversorger because that will be more expensive, and also Vattenfall is I think, not a great company, probably.

[25:31] And yeah, but you don't have to do this before you move in. You just do it within the three months after you move. Then you go to these websites, put in all your information, and then they will sign you up and also do the switch from the old one. So you never have to cancel the old one. Also, if you do make a reminder and you switch your contract nine months later or a year later, you actually never have to manually cancel your old contract - your old gas or electricity contract - because the new one will always do this for you. And in both cases, basically all you need is the number of your counter, your gas counter or electricity counter, usually in the basement. But yeah, that's how that works. I will link two articles from All About Berlin as well.

After the Move: Internet

[26:23] And then the last topic, near and dear to my heart, is internet. And internet is not part of this Grundversorgung system where you just have it when you move in, and then you deal with the contract later. internet, you have to get a contract and wait for them to set it up. And this oftentimes can take some time, at least two weeks usually, in other cases even longer. And there are different ways to get internet into your apartment, and it very much depends on where you live which of these is available to you. Fibre optic is obviously the future and what anybody who does a lot of things on the internet would want to have. But unfortunately most apartments don't get fibre to the home. But if you do, then it's probably through a company or company called PYUR - I have no idea how to pronounce this company, P-Y-U-R - so I would just go to their website, and use this button that says, Verfügbarkeit prüfen (or Verfügbarkeit checken) and then put in your address and see if they have it.

[27:49] For me, it says: „An Ihrer Adresse ist ausschließlich Basis TV mit vielen beliebten TV-Sendern buchbar“ So, it's not like they're telling me, you know: We can't service you, they are trying to sell me some other product, which is TV, but not internet, fibre optic. So you can safely ignore this, but I will check. Maybe you are in a place that has fibre, and if you do, then I would sign up for it. The next best option, I would say, and the one that is available in most households, is DSL. And DSL, as well as the other alternatives. which are Kabelinternet, cable internet and LTE, which I don't really think is an alternative. But all of these you can also check through these websites that I mentioned, Verivox and CHECK24. So they each have ... let's check: Verivox: there's Internet, and then you can click on DSL und Kabel Angebote and then you can do a little search. Vorwahl for Berlin is 030, and let's say you want at least 100 Mbit/s down, which I would recommend. And then they show you all the contracts, starting with Vodafone, Telekom, 1&1, and so on.

[29:17] And then the same that I mentioned for electricity and gas applies here. You want to really look at the pricing because it often is much cheaper in the first year or the first two years, and then you need to remember to cancel. But if you don't cancel, it gets more expensive. Also, cancelling might not make much sense because there aren't actually that many alternatives. So I would really look at the one that makes the most sense. They all ... In terms of the companies, I mean, Telekom is maybe the best one? They used to own ... Like they still run and own the infrastructure, if I understand it correctly. They used to be state-owned, now they're private, but they're also rather expensive usually. Vodafone is usually a little bit cheaper. I think. They have terrible customer service, just terrible customer service. But I haven't had any issues in terms of it working, but I know other people do have lots of issues. There's really no great option. So I would say, yeah, Vodafone, Telekom, 1&1, I mean they're all equally good or bad depending on your luck, essentially. I would just make sure that you get a DSL contract. And don't just check the download speeds, but also check the upload speeds. Some of them are really slow in the upload. I would make sure you have at least 40 Mbit/s in the upload as well.

[30:52] And then, yeah, cable. If you really can't get DSL, you might consider cable. My building doesn't actually have cable, so that's also something where you need to just do a check on one of these websites, either Vodafone, for example, you can check if they serve you cable. If they do, then others will too. And cable is, in theory, sometimes faster than DSL, but it really depends on the actual cables in your building, and also how many people are using it to watch TV at night, and things like that. I don't know, it seems a little less reliable, I think, than DSL. But I've had cable in the past and it worked. I mean, it's also fine. It's just a different thing. If you are someone who watches TV, then you might actually want to get like a cable TV and internet package, similar to how I think it's often done in the US, but if not, then maybe DSL should be your first choice.

[31:58] And then LTE is obviously what you use for your mobile phone normally. But nowadays sometimes ... I think O2 does this a lot where they tell you: Hey, we'll send you this box and it has a second LTE router, but as long as it's in your house or as long as it's in your apartment, it gives you WiFi, and it works anywhere and you don't need anything for it to work. I would not recommend doing this, just because LTE, I mean, it can be very fast, especially in a big city like this, but I think anything that's going through an actual cable is probably more reliable and less prone to outages and problems, and stuff like that. But in a pinch, if you really can't get anything else, then you might look into that as an option.

[32:53] Okay, if you're still listening, then thank you very much! This was probably a little bit boring, but hopefully useful to someone who is preparing for a move here. Send us your messages, send us your feedback, send us your questions, topic requests, and we look forward to talking to you soon.