Tenant’s legal insurance in Germany: Essentials
- Tenant’s legal insurance protects you against the financial consequences of legal disputes with your landlord or neighbors. It is recommended for both tenants and owners of homes or condominiums.
- However, as a landlord, you need exceptional legal insurance, which is normally not included in the tenant’s legal insurance.
- It’s important to note that a tenant’s legal insurance is an additional module of private legal insurance covering other legal disputes.
- For ex-pats in Germany, we strongly recommend private legal insurance from FinTech insurers Feather and Getsafe. Their policies cover legal issues in different areas of law. Optionally, they include high-performance tenant legal insurance, offering you comprehensive protection. Both insurance providers offer fully digital insurance products and services in English, ensuring you feel supported and understood in legal matters.
Germany: Legal insurance with different modules
With legal protection insurance, you insure your legal expenses in different areas of law. Common legal insurance types refer to private law, social law, professional law, traffic law, tenant’s and housing law, and criminal law. Except for traffic offenses, criminal law coverage can be taken out for criminal offenses and misdemeanors committed through negligence. Some legal insurance providers offer extended criminal legal protection for accusations of intentionally committed crimes. However, in the event of a guilty verdict, any legal costs already reimbursed must be repaid to the insurance company.
Legal insurance in Germany is always based on private legal protection, which you can supplement with additional modules. In this way, you acquire legal insurance for areas of law in which you need it. Professional legal insurance, criminal law protection coverage, or tenant’s legal insurance can only be combined with private legal protection.
In Germany, legal insurance covers your legal bills in the insured areas of law. Many standard policies for legal insurance in Germany combine private, employment, and traffic legal insurance. You can then purchase the tenant’s legal insurance as a tariff extension. When choosing insurance, however, you should consider the tariff’s overall performance in all insured legal areas.
Benefits of a tenant’s legal insurance in Germany
With tenant’s legal protection insurance, you insure legal costs related to tenant law and housing. This insurance policy makes sense for tenants and owners who live in their houses or condominiums. You can only book this insurance as an extension to private legal insurance.
Legal insurance cover for tenants and property owners
Regarding the coverage of this legal insurance policy, a distinction must be made between explicit tenant’s legal insurance and legal insurance for owners of owner-occupied property.
Tenant’s legal insurance cover
Tenant’s legal insurance covers generally includes legal support in the following cases:
- Tenancy disputes: landlord-related conflicts, such as terminations, unlawful or excessive rent increases, disputed utility bills, or rental defects.
- Deposit: Support in disputes over the repayment of the rental deposit.
- Tenancy agreement matters: Review and advice on tenancy agreement issues.
- Defects and maintenance: support in enforcing claims due to defects in the apartment (e.g., mold, heating failure)
- Neighborhood disputes: For example, noise and odor nuisance, use of common areas, compliance with the house rules, obstructions/access blockages to your own rented property by neighbors.
Owner’s residential legal insurance cover
For owners who occupy their property themselves, legal insurance in Germany covers the following areas:
- Neighborhood disputes and property law: Additionally to neighborhood disputes of tenants, for example, disputes about structural changes on neighboring properties with effects on your property, disputes about rights of use and way, disputes over property boundaries
- Real estate purchases and sales: Legal advice and support in disputes concerning the purchase or sale of real estate.
- Construction defects and construction contracts: Support in disputes with construction companies or tradespeople regarding construction defects or breaches of contract.
- Condominium owners’ association: Legal assistance in conflicts within a condominium owners’ association, e.g., regarding resolutions, accounts, or construction measures.
- Insurance law matters: Support in disputes with insurance companies in connection with the property
If purchasing legal insurance for homeowners, you should pay particular attention to the benefits your insurance provider offers. Not all legal insurance policies provide owners with the full range of relevant benefits. In addition, you should expect higher insurance costs with such a policy than with pure tenants’ legal protection.
General benefits of legal insurance in Germany
For both tenants and owners, legal insurance in Germany also offers various general benefits relating to housing.
Reimbursable legal costs
In particular, the insurance reimburses the following legal costs:
- Lawyer fees
- Court fees
- Legal fees for out-of-court mediation
- Expert and witness costs
- Enforcement costs
- Travel expenses, for example, for lawyers and experts
- Translation costs
General legal services
Other general benefits of a tenant’s legal insurance include free legal consultation from the insurance company’s lawyers by telephone or personally and, depending on the insurer, various online services.
In principle, you can choose which lawyer you would like to instruct with your legal insurance — so you have a free choice of lawyer. However, many legal insurance companies work with a network of cooperating lawyers. Using such a lawyer can have advantages, such as faster processing and sometimes lower costs for the excess.
Info: Obtain a cover note from your legal insurance company before starting a legal dispute!
Before you tell a lawyer, you must always get a cover note from your legal insurance company. This guarantees the insurance company will cover the costs of the dispute. The insurance company is entitled to reject a case due to a lack of prospects of success — however, you may appeal against such a decision.
Tenant’s legal insurance — coverage limits
The tenant’s legal insurance does not cover some legal services. These include — except for a few costly premium tariffs — landlord’s legal protection and all legal disputes that arose before the insurance was taken out or during the waiting period.
Tenant’s legal insurance has a waiting period of three months — the insurance company only pays for disputes that arise after this period has expired. Some legal insurance providers offer tariffs without waiting periods, but these are correspondingly expensive. You can obtain tenant’s legal insurance without a waiting period if you change your insurer and transfer from your old legal insurance contract to the new policy without any gaps.
The insurance company can also refuse to pay if you have hired a lawyer without a cover note or if it believes you have caused the legal dispute willfully.
Tenant’s legal insurance cost
What you pay for your legal insurance depends on the overall package you have booked. With private legal protection, you insure a wide range of potential legal issues in your private life. Additional modules such as traffic or employment legal insurance may also be included.
According to Stiftung Finanztest, legal insurance policies become 30% to 50% pricier when tenants’ legal insurance is integrated.
Deductibles are common in tenant’s legal insurance. They are usually between €150 and €300. With some insurers, the excess increases after a claim. A no-claim bonus is also possible after an insurance year without a claim.
Selection criteria for good legal insurance
When choosing your insurance, you should pay attention to the benefits in tenant and residential legal protection, the scope of benefits, and the conditions of the overall package. The following criteria are essential here:
- Legal insurance costs: price and price-performance ratio of the insurance policy, deductibles, no-claims bonus
- Sum insured: We recommend a minimum cover of €5 million or a policy with unlimited cover within Europe
- Co-insurance of second homes: Second homes should also be insured in the legal insurance policy.
- Legal advice by telephone from the insurance company’s lawyers at no extra cost
Info: Conditions for contract termination by the insurance company
After two or more claims per year, the legal insurance company can cancel your contract. Before you sign the contract, you should know what a potential provider considers a claim. This should never include legal advice the insurance company gives over the phone.
Finding a good tenant’s legal insurance in Germany
Tenant’s legal insurance can be purchased through numerous companies. Independent product evaluations, rate calculators, or advice from an insurance expert can guide you to find the best legal insurance.
The policies from the FinTech insurers Feather and Getsafe are among the best legal insurance in Germany. We recommend them to expats who want high-performance, fully digital legal insurance with English-language service.
In addition to their legal insurance, both companies offer various other insurances, such as private supplementary dental insurance and liability insurance, and Feather also offers private health insurance.
Feather legal insurance
Feather’s standard legal insurance is available in the Basic and Advanced tariffs from €13.51 per month. They cover private legal insurance, traffic legal insurance, and professional legal insurance for employees and part-time self-employed persons and have the following sums insured and waiting periods:
- Basic: €1 million within the EU, €250,000 worldwide, 6-month waiting period
- Advanced: unlimited coverage within the EU, €500,000 worldwide, 3-month waiting period
You can supplement both tariffs with high-performance tenant’s legal insurance and landlord’s legal protection. Upon request, you will receive an individual offer from Feather. Feather’s tenant’s and landlord’s legal insurance includes all relevant services in these areas of law and free legal advice from the company’s lawyers.
Your initial excess is €300, with a no-claims discount of €100 for every claim-free year. After a claim, you pay an excess of €500 /strong> in the following insurance year.
Getsafe legal insurance
Getsafe also offers combined private, professional, and traffic legal insurance. This legal insurance is only available in one tariff; legal insurance costs start at €15.12 per month. Within the EU, the sum insured is unlimited, while worldwide coverage is €500,000.
As an additional module, Getsafe offers tenant legal insurance. The waiting period is three months; legal disputes with the tax office regarding house and property matters are covered without a waiting period. Getsafe prepares an individual offer for this additional insurance.
The deductible is €300 in the first year, with a €100 no-claims bonus per insurance year. After an insured event, the excess rises to €500 the following year.
Conclusion
With tenant’s legal insurance, you protect yourself against the economic consequences of legal disputes relating to your home. Most insurers offer combined policies for private, professional, and traffic legal protection. You can book the tenant’s legal insurance as an additional module.
We recommend the FinTech insurers Feather and Getsafe, especially to expats, for their legal insurance in Germany. Their legal insurance offers excellent benefits, transparent conditions, affordable costs, and digital and personal service in English.
Frequently Asked Questions — FAQ
In our view, definitely. Legal disputes relating to housing are widespread. The German Tenants’ Association (Deutscher Mieterbund) — Germany’s most prominent representative body for tenants — reported around 850,000 advice cases in tenancy disputes in 2022. Legal disputes over utility bills were the most common, accounting for 41.7% of all disputes. Court cases, on the other hand, were (2021) mainly due to breaches of contract in tenancy law, legal disputes about operating and ancillary costs, rent deposits, rent increases, and landlord’s notices of termination for personal use.
If you seek advice from a lawyer without legal insurance, you can expect to pay at least €190 per consultation; in a court case, lawyer fees and court costs can quickly add up to several €1,000. Tenant’s legal insurance, on the other hand, offers affordable protection. It ensures you are financially secure and can navigate legal disputes without the fear of significant costs, providing financial relief.
Whether a tenant’s legal insurance makes sense for you as a homeowner depends on whether you live in your home or rent it out. A tenant’s legal insurance is beneficial if you own a home or condominium and live in it. It not only insures you against legal disputes arising from a tenancy but also with neighbors. This could involve disputes about using communal areas, the impact of neighboring properties — such as overhanging branches or falling leaves — noise pollution, or disagreements about keeping pets. However, if you have rented your house or apartment, you will need special legal protection. The tenant’s legal insurance does not cover legal disputes with your tenants.
If you decide to take out legal protection insurance, as a tenant or owner, you should include legal protection for tenants in your policy. The situation is different if you don’t need comprehensive legal insurance but would like coverage against legal disputes relating to your home. In this case, you can choose between two alternatives:
- Membership in a tenants’ association provides you with legal advice on tenancy matters, energy issues, and neighborhood conflicts. The association will also be able to help you with correspondence with your landlord, property management, and authorities. These services are covered by your membership fee, which is between €50 and €100 per year, depending on the association. The associations do not usually provide out-of-court mediation. Additional fees will be charged if the association is also to represent you in court. As with legal expenses insurance, there is a three-month waiting period.
- If you want to avoid committing to legal expenses insurance or a tenants’ association in the long term, you can consider representation by a legal service provider. Legal service providers often specialize in certain areas of law, such as tenancy and wage law. They work on a contingency fee basis. Before they take on a legal dispute, they check its chances of success. Hiring a legal service provider is also a suitable solution for legal disputes that fall within the waiting period of legal expenses insurance.