Vortrag von Christoph M. Achammer im aut in Innsbruck

Ladies and gentlemen, I'll try to provoke quickly to warm things up. As promised, I'll adapt what I said last year for Tyrol, since Tyrol is the ultimate laboratory for land issues in Europe. We face 500 million EU citizens who want land here, and we have limited habitable land. Land is the only truly non-renewable resource in our activities. Historically, land appropriation has been violent. But when land is used not for agriculture but for building houses, it becomes a different story. As part of the planning and construction industry, we are responsible for land consumption. In Tyrol, we have about 12% permanent settlement area, with 0.4% built-up area and much more traffic area. Austria consumes about 115,000 square meters of land per day, half of which is sealed. In Tyrol, about a quarter of permanent settlement area is consumed. To address this, we need legal frameworks, mobility concepts, and economic changes. Current legal frameworks like spatial planning are often project-driven rather than autonomous. Density concepts show that privacy begins below 0.4, and urban quality starts around 1 to 1.5, but Tyrol's densities are in between, leading to suburban sprawl. Building types matter: detached houses on 400 sqm plots with narrow streets versus attached housing that reduces exterior walls and increases green space. Mobility requirements for parking spaces waste land and money. We must move beyond promises and implement concrete measures. One immediate measure is to secure land transaction gains with inflation and tax-free consumption, with excess going to the municipality for long-term use rights. The public sector should only grant building rights, not sell land. Ultimately, we could shift to usage fees on public land, reducing income tax. These changes would curb speculation and promote equitable land use.

The reaction was, I believe, even broadcast on Tirol TV, where he thanked me multiple times for thinking about such things but said it's not feasible. I don't know any argument against it. But that was still a very restrained discussion. I remember a discussion in Vienna where the chief economist of Raiffeisenbanken, Mr. Brezinczek, foam at the mouth and with a neoliberal reflex called me a hidden communist. I said, step back. This concept was developed with two colleagues, both major developers, Value One and UBM, because the real estate industry in all of Europe struggles with high land prices, and now with inflation and energy prices, it's worse. If nothing changes, we'll see great social upheavals in the next two or three years, and land reform would be a first step in the right direction.

I believe that all expropriation ideologies are first and foremost ideologies not justifiable with our worldview. I wouldn't be for it. Moreover, they are not enforceable due to the constitution. When you want to change things, you must propose concepts that the majority can go along with. If you talk about expropriations, the topic is already settled. That's a bit like the Greens' environmental movement: if you want too much, you move nothing. You must change things in steps, with frameworks supported by the majority. That's my opinion.

The value-added tax in transaction areas could likely be implemented at the state level. There is already a federal speculation tax, but it's too low. At this level, I'm fairly sure it could be enforced if desired. But I'm not a constitutional lawyer; it doesn't really matter because if a state wants it, it gains momentum that is likely majority-capable. You pointed out that in Germany, important provisions in the Basic Law state that property entails obligations, while we have an extensive and unrestricted concept of property in the Austrian State Basic Law of 1867 without social obligations of property. This is used to argue against change, as Provincial Councilor Prater and lawyer Dr. Wallnöfer did last week, saying it's unconstitutional. But constitutional changes for such interventions would be necessary, and that's a longer path.

I would explain the concept of property... A constitutional change will never happen; what we need is a majority. Then comes the famous Tyrolean mentality and attachment to the land, and all that nonsense. As if it wasn't violently eradicated so that private property could emerge at all. But what is the answer now? Specifically and step by step, how do we get these constitutional concerns out of the way? That is why I answered you: I have no use for expropriation, as that is protected by the constitution. Tax law-wise, nothing is prevented if we say: as it is now, we already have the situation that in a transaction, say one sells a property or house with land to another, a certain percentage of this transaction value must be paid over. It is just about this percentage being calculated differently and higher, and that's it. And that has nothing to do with interference with constitutional rights.

I don't believe that there will be resistance of the same magnitude. Of course, there is a group of losers who today own large agricultural areas. We have seen in the last three years what ideas they come up with to cushion so-called hardship cases, at any cost. I do not exclude that we will come up with intelligent solutions to still implement the methodology in its core. Because you are completely right: how do you determine the initial value? Well, as long as it's in the land register, we know when it was bought, and then with a factor of 200 because inflation is so high, and so on. But it's about the fundamental approach to this story and how you turn the lever. And if we don't do that, then all these well-intentioned initiatives—I don't want to offend anyone, it's important to talk about density and building culture and building quality, etc.—but in the matter itself, it doesn't bring anything.

Of course, you cannot beat down every idea with one concept. I believe if we manage to get land out of the speculative environment, that is a huge step made. Vacancies or unused designated building land reserves will inevitably be used; the vacancy levy won't promote that. Then only one thing helps: it goes in your direction of high taxation and changing the tax system. The only thing that helps, you know, I don't blame anyone who says I speculate with land, as I said before, in light of these experiences of the last ten years. If someone had 100,000 euros and didn't buy land somewhere, I understand that. So I believe we must create framework conditions that assume people are selfish economic beings, not saints. We must work from a different image of humanity and create conditions that capture this image and intensify it so that people behave in a way that benefits the common good.

Land must not be left to the private market. My ideal is that Austria belongs to the municipalities, and the municipality charges for the capitalist use of the individual property: building rights, a usage fee. Then one can plan with completely different horizons. Every city planner knows what that means: if he develops a big idea and someone has a plot, but not with me, he can throw his entire city planning over the heap. While if I do it with building rights horizons, I can really plan. A side aspect comes to mind: many years ago we invited the then mayor of Bayern in Bayern, and with Florian Nagler and us all, concepts were made. The basic concept was land policy to prevent urban sprawl, with exchange principles and so on. Then he did something: based on a concept by Florian Nagler, a urban design with public and private areas, he leased these plots only on building rights for 140 years, the average lifespan in Bayern. The interesting thing was that years later, when examining these building rights single-family settlements, they found that the share of children was higher because young families could afford more children since they didn't have to buy the land and build, which was often not possible with pure ownership. This is very interesting. Incidentally, this is a story from the current development of the finance-driven real estate industry: there are already several funds that only buy the land under existing buildings and charge the entire owner only a building right, which means suddenly enormous liquidity is created. I know 20 projects in Germany—high-rises in the middle of the city—where the fund that owns the high-rise approaches and says, 'I'll pay you for the land X,' and this X is converted into a building right when interest rates are very low. Suddenly you have high liquidity, and I have a reasonable investment form where I can also factor in speculation. Everything you say: as soon as we stop that land must be ownership and not use, that is also a significant relief for people with less money because they can distribute it over 45 or 99 years and don't have to provide this primary investment of 50% or more of the total costs.

Well, I am not a politician, but it is a very personal initiative that I represent in my entire company, but also in my environment with my clients. And I must tell you that I would say 70-80% of non-politicians after a certain period of thought are enthusiastic about it. Especially from our industry, I said earlier why that is: because then we can concentrate more on the value-creating activity of our profession—inventing smart projects, planning smart projects, building smart projects, marketing and selling small projects, and not just saying I have to do everything to make this expensive land price at the bottom somehow affordable. When we talk to housing developers and discuss prefabricated products, one of the big arguments against it is: Mr. Achammer, we have to use every plot we approach to the last square meter that building or spatial planning allows, and if we could reduce the setback area and go up, forget your standardized industrial product. And that is actually not in the spirit of the inventor.

It depends on how much you bought the land for. Of course, again, if you bought the land 20 years ago for 300 euros, with or without rezoning, it doesn't matter. Then the idea would be to say these 300 euros should be value-secured over these 20 years, pay nothing for it, and everything above between 80 and 100% is taxed away. What naturally, if you bought it today for 2000 euros, then you bought it for 2000 euros. So without interventions in property, you cannot do that. But again, the whole idea is to create framework conditions to take speculative land out of the market from today, and every day you don't do that is a lost day.

A transformation from ownership to use does not change the demand for the quality of what is built on it, both from the building regulations—that doesn't change anything, still densities of 0.6 are granted and not 1.2 or 1.5, that has nothing to do with it. Of course, but I believe that when this enormous financial pressure from speculation is removed from spatial planning, spatial planning gets completely different framework conditions of planning freedom, which it doesn't have today. I just came from a jury in Düsseldorf; there, in a competition, they discuss only how many cubic meters can be placed on this plot. And architects like Berkel and Kader Wittfeld tear themselves apart to put something there where then all city councillors say yes, that's justifiable. Point. And the one doing it doesn't care how it looks; he just wants someone to say yes, it's justifiable. As soon as you remove that pressure, I believe there is a completely different opening for qualitative treatment of the space in which we want to live.

I base my optimism only on when this great financial incentive is gone, then this change in consciousness could happen more easily. But somewhere in optimistic dreams, one must also position oneself.

Thank you, the question is, as I correctly understood, surplus tapped and the municipality then pre-emption rights. Long-term considered, we take a municipality in Tyrol, that means over a longer time, the municipality will be owner of all plots, and those who build are only users. But the other question is what changes in the way of development as you showed at the beginning, these 400 square meters? That would not restrict land consumption here, but only take out speculation. So the other topic must not be left out.

You are completely right, that is everywhere the key: if we move away from burdensome ownership to dynamic, adequate use. We know today the situation: if I look up in Mühlau or towards Arzl, that is a burden from an inherited single-family house from the 70s or 60s, he can't do otherwise. A developer sells it and does it. Some are even restricted in their flexibility: we have employees who would like to go to another office in Hamburg or Berlin, but because of the owner-occupied apartment, they can't rent it out because if rented for more than three years, they never get it back, etc. That costs extra. I believe you have seen this story with the detached single-family house and the terraced house under 'quotes'—you can't say it because then I'm not a worker and no worker lives in a terraced house, but nonsense. That is what is in the head. I can remember growing up in a house of an architect, and my mother in the 50s won a competition for a worker's house from Swarovski, and built two terraced houses, the only ones in Wattens; everything else were small Swarovski villas. So there is a lot that must change in the head. But again, I believe if the economic framework conditions are set, it is a first step for other things to happen. I am an optimist.

Yes, perhaps for the conclusion, if you, I urge you, I ask you, let these things go through your head, and if you find them appealing, tell them further and discuss with people. We must not forget we are the rulers, not we are ruled, but we determine our legislative representatives. We do not determine the executive because who becomes state governor is of no concern to me; it is about the people who sit in the state parliament, those who represent us, and we must seek majorities.