The rent control, which was announced by the ÖVP and the Greens but has not yet been implemented, has now led to the first lawsuits, which were announced in August. The reason for this is possible illegal value protection clauses, also called index clauses. Rulings by the Supreme Court (OGH) recently indicated inadmissibility under the Consumer Protection Act. And this is where attorney Oliver Peschel comes in with a class action lawsuit.
“The impact of the two Supreme Court decisions on existing contracts is also highly controversial in expert circles,” the Austrian Real Estate Industry Association (ÖVI) said when Peschel announced his actions in midsummer. “The special provisions of tenancy law limit recovery to three years.”
Peschel, on the other hand, reiterated on Tuesday that many of the value protection clauses were “inadmissible due to the current Supreme Court rulings.” “You are violating the Consumer Protection Act.”
Lawyer talks about 30 years of possibility of recovery
The landlord is “concerned and is trying to downplay the problem” and is throwing “smoke grenades,” the lawyer said. So it’s not just a matter of a few thousand tenants affected, as the real estate industry represents, and not just a matter of three years. “We assume a significantly higher number of affected contracts and also take into account the legal basis for a 30-year possibility to reclaim impermissible rent increases,” Peschel said. His law firm in Vienna has now filed the first lawsuits in all of Austria, more information at mietzinsklage.at.
If successful, the tenants received an unjustly increased rent back and from now on they only had to pay the originally agreed rent. The law firm expects to make the first statements early next year. From the ÖVI’s point of view, it is “more than doubtful whether the OGH will really decide this in the specific individual case”, as shown by a model lawsuit filed by the Chamber of Labor (AK) (8 Ob 37/23h and 2 Ob 36 /23t).
It has become quiet about the announced rent control
There was recently a public silence surrounding the rent ceiling announced by the ÖVP and the Greens, but discussions were taking place in the background. The talk was that there would now be a simple legal solution instead of a law with constitutional status. The two-thirds majority required for constitutional status was recently not in sight.
Bill in committee
The coalition announced at the end of August that tenants can expect a rent increase of up to 5 percent per year in the future – for a period of three years. From 2027, the valorization for both category and benchmark rents must be calculated on the basis of the average inflation of the past three years and only half of the part above 5 percent will be taken into account in the adjustment, the design of the ‘ Inflation Relief Act’. about rental legislation,” continues. The bill was assigned to the responsible buildings committee in parliament. The draft contains constitutional provisions. With a two-thirds majority, legal certainty would be greater.
Source: Krone
I’m Ben Stock, a journalist and author at Today Times Live. I specialize in economic news and have been working in the news industry for over five years. My experience spans from local journalism to international business reporting. In my career I’ve had the opportunity to interview some of the world’s leading economists and financial experts, giving me an insight into global trends that is unique among journalists.
