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MAGDEBURG.
that any large proportion of these small tenements were of the kind occupied by
working-class families, for the average rents charged were :—
For a single room ... ... ... £7 1 s. per annum.
„ two rooms ... ... ... £9 Is. ,, ,,
„ three rooms ... ... ... £16 4s. ,, „
These rents are much higher than those actually paid by working-class families
for tenements of one, two and three rooms respectively. Evidence of this is
afforded by an investigation undertaken recently by the municipal statistical
office in Magdeburg into the housing conditions of the workpeople in the
regular service of the municipality. Among 1,138 married men so employed
26 were found to be lodgers, while 113 lived outside the town. Among the 999
married workmen who were found to be living in Magdeburg, a few were
housed rent free in consideration of services rendered either to the municipality
or to their respective landlords. Omitting these, there remained for consideration
944 dwellings of married municipal workmen living in Magdeburg and
renting dwellings on the ordinary terms. Of these 944 dwellings, 716, or just
over three-fourths, consisted of a general living room with a stove, a stoveless
bedroom, and a kitchen (Stube, Kammer, Küche).
The average rents paid were as follows :—
Average Rent. '
Per Year.
Equivalent per Week.
One room (used for all purposes)
Two rooms (living room and stoveless bedroom,
or living room and kitchen).
Three rooms (living room, stoveless bedroom
and kitchen).
£ s. d.
4 2 0
6 9 6
7 17 0
s. d.
1 7
2 6
3 0
It will be seen that the average rent paid for three rooms consisting of a
living room, a stoveless bedroom and a kitchen was os. per week, which is less
than half the rent shown in the previous table as the average for unoccupied
three-roomed tenements.
Among a total of 58,319 dwellings in Magdeburg in December, 1905,
17,717 or 30 per cent, consisted of three such rooms as those just mentioned—
a general living room with a stove, a bedroom without a stove, and a kitchen ;
this represents the dwelling accommodation of the mass of the working-class
families in Magdeburg. Of these 17,717 dwellings of the working-class type
10,900 were in " back-houses,” that is to say, houses which stand behind those
visible from the street and which can only be reached from the street either through
the main doorways of the front houses, or else—in the older parts of the town—
through archway passages similar to those leading to the " courts ” in some of
the older working-class districts of Liverpool. Other things being equal backhouse
tenements fetch slightly lower rents than front-house tenements in the
same street, the difference in rent being greatest in streets—and there are many
—where the former are inhabited mostly by working-class, and the latter mostly
by middle-class families, and least in streets where both front and back-houses
are largely tenanted by the working classes.
Through the courtesy of the municipal statistical office of Magdeburg it has
been possible to ascertain the rent paid for the whole of the above 17,717 threeroomed
tenements of the working-class type in December, 1905. The aggregate
yearly rent was found to be £149,941 or £8 9s. od. per tenement, which
corresponds to a weekly rental of about 3s. 1& For 8,414, or nearly one-half
of these dwellings, the rents ranged from 2s. 11 d. to 3s. 8d. per week.
The predominant rents for typical working-class tenements of three rooms
in Magdeburg in December, 1905, may therefore be stated at 2s. 11 d. to 3s. 8d.
per week. Taking rent at Berlin as 100, the corresponding figure for
Madgeburg is as low as 43.
In most of the tenements of this kind visited for purposes of the present
inquiry the rents were found to be within the limits stated. As regards the
accommodation available at such rents in the old town, the dwellings contained
