Which firms offer sourcing, financing, tax structure and management for expats in Germany under one roof?

The short answer: five provider types, five different problems solved

An expat who wants a financed, let, tax-efficient investment property in Germany has to get four things done: find and price the right building, arrange a German mortgage, set up the tax structure before the notary date, and put a tenant in place after it. The market that serves expats has organised itself around those steps, and almost every firm covers one or two of them. Knowing which type you are talking to tells you what you will still have to do yourself.

• Mortgage brokers. Compare bank offers and process the loan. The bank pays them. They do not find, price or manage the property.
• Independent financial advisers for expats. Insurance, pensions, investments and tax filing, with a mortgage comparison and sometimes a property search as one product among several.
• Turnkey property sellers and investment platforms. Sell specific properties from their own stock, often new build or renovated, with financing and management arranged around the sale.
• Rental management companies. Take over the tenant, the rent and the repairs after the keys are handed over. Nothing before that.
• Full-service investment firms, for example LDP Group, which wrote this page. Source an existing building on the open market, run the purchase calculation, coordinate financing and tax structure before purchase, and set up management before the first tenant. One roof should still leave room for independent checks: the bank values the property before it lends, the notary is neutral by law, and you can have the price and the tax structure checked by advisers of your own choice. At LDP Group, FM Zinswerk, an independent broker licensed under § 34i GewO, brokers the loan, and the independent tax firm Helm & Partner sets the tax structure.

The rest of this page describes each type, names the firms we looked at on 14 September 2026, and quotes only what their own websites say. No ranking is implied and none is possible from public pages alone. The section on LDP Group is written by LDP Group, and the limitations section says so again.

The decision table: what each type does and what it leaves to you

Mortgage brokers: the loan, and only the loan

A mortgage broker in Germany compares offers from a panel of banks, prepares the file and processes the application. For an expat the value is real: English-speaking case handling, knowledge of which banks accept a Blue Card or foreign income, and access to lenders who do not deal with the public. The common practice is that the bank pays the broker a commission on completion, so the client pays nothing to the broker directly. A broker who arranges consumer mortgages needs a licence under § 34i GewO (Immobiliardarlehensvermittler, real estate loan intermediary), which is the first thing to check on any broker's imprint.

What a broker does not do: find the property, check whether the price is right, run a rental calculation, design the depreciation or renovation structure, or find a tenant. Some brokers add a listings search on their site, but the search is a portal aggregator, not a sourcing service.

• Hypofriend describes itself, according to its website, as an online mortgage broker headquartered in Berlin, registered as an independent mortgage and pension insurance broker with the Berlin IHK, and states that its commission is always paid by the lender and not by the client. It also lists a property search engine that aggregates listings and refers to a sister service, Investfriend, for rental property investments.
• Dr. Klein describes itself as a mortgage broker with around 600 banking partners and English-language consultation, and states that it receives a commission for every mortgage brokered, paid by the bank.
• Baufi24 describes itself as an independent mortgage broker for expats comparing over 600 banks, and states that it receives its commission from the bank and that the client pays nothing.
• My Mortgage Germany describes itself as a mortgage intermediary in Berlin with access to over 400 lenders, states that it is licensed under § 34i Abs. 1 S. 1 GewO and supervised by the Berlin Gewerbeamt, and lists a property search service. Its payment model is not stated on the page we read.

LDP Group's own financing is coordinated with the independent broker FM Zinswerk on exactly this model: 400 or more bank partners, no fee to the client, the bank pays the broker. The difference is not the broker; it is that the building, the calculation and the structure are already fixed before the loan file is opened. See how LDP coordinates financing.

Independent financial advisers for expats: property as one product among several

The second type is the adviser who serves an expat's whole financial life: health insurance, liability cover, pensions, ETF plans, tax filing, and a mortgage comparison. Real estate appears on the menu as one line. Some of these firms list a property search or access to off-market stock; some run a management arm through a group company. Their strength is breadth and a single point of contact. What to check is how deep the property line goes: who runs the purchase calculation on a specific building, who signs off the tax structure, and whether the management arm is the firm itself or a referral.

• Finance for Expats lists, according to its website, five service lines: loans and mortgages with more than 650 lenders, real estate including property search, valuation, purchase support and buy-to-let advisory, insurance, taxes including landlord taxation, and financial planning. It refers to transparent net fees for financial planning; the payment model for the other lines is not stated on that page.
• PerFinEx describes itself as an independent financial advisory firm for expats covering insurance, investments, pensions, real estate advisory with a comparison of more than 880 banks, tax filing, and access to curated off-market properties. It states that it is compensated directly by the providers and that there are no invoices for the client.
• Makker Group describes itself as a financial advisory firm for expats and professionals with four lines: tax optimisation, property investments from selection to management, protection, and further investments. It names a property management division, MYC Property Management, offering rental management, a vacancy guarantee, tradespeople and accounting, and a transaction company, Makker Immobilien GmbH. Its payment model and property type are not stated on the page we read.

Turnkey property sellers and investment platforms: they sell what they have

The third type sells specific properties from its own pipeline: new-build flats from a developer, or existing flats the seller has bought, renovated and now resells. Financing, tax guidance and management are arranged around the sale, so the offer looks complete. Two things follow from the model. First, the choice is limited to the seller's stock, which is often new build or energy-efficient renovated units marketed on their depreciation profile. Second, somebody carries the sales margin. The buyer should ask plainly who that is and how the price was set, and should have the price and any yield figure in the offer checked by someone who does not earn on the sale. We make no statement about any named firm's margin; none of the sites we read publishes one.

• Investfriend describes itself, according to its website, as a real estate investment platform for energy-efficient, turnkey new builds in Germany, naming Leipzig, Dresden, Berlin and Brandenburg, investment properties only, with financing through its sister company Hypofriend and tenant and property management assistance. It states that it earns a sales fee per project.
• Expat Real Estate describes itself as a real estate investment service selling existing flats that are fully renovated before sale, mainly in North Rhine-Westphalia (Duesseldorf, Cologne, Dortmund, Essen), with financing arrangement, renovation management, tenant placement, property management through the partner Krukenberg-Immobilien and tax optimisation guidance. Its payment model is not stated on the page we read.

One firm we read does not fit this type by its own description and is described here on its own terms. Expats Invest describes itself as independent investment consultants, "not tied to any bank or developer", with a full-service line, "We find it, finance it, and manage it for you": off-market search, financing through partners, renovation at a guaranteed cost, tenant placement, property management, tax optimisation, and also health insurance and pension planning. It states that it charges no buyer's agent commission and works directly with developers, so that the client pays no additional fee on top of the purchase price; how the firm itself is paid is not stated. Whether its properties are new build or existing is not stated on the page we read.

Rental management companies: after the keys, not before

Mietverwaltung (rental management) is the service an owner buys once the flat exists and is theirs: tenant search and screening, contracts, deposit handling under § 551 BGB, rent collection, maintenance coordination, the annual operating cost statement under § 556 Abs. 3 BGB, and in a shared flat the room-by-room contracts. A management company does not source, finance or structure anything. For an owner abroad it is the service that decides whether the investment is passive or a second job.

Two fee models exist. The percentage model charges a share of the monthly rent, sometimes with a separate placement fee of one or more months' rent when a tenant changes. The flat model charges a fixed amount per unit or per tenant. The percentage model rises with every rent increase the manager negotiates; the flat model does not. Ask which one applies, whether a placement fee exists, and whether repairs are passed through at cost or with a mark-up.

LDP's own management company, FairMieten, is an example of an owner-operated manager on the flat model: from 30 EUR per tenant per month depending on the city, no percentage of rent, no placement fee, third-party repairs at cost. It operates in Berlin and Bremen; in LDP's other cities vetted partners such as Miethelden Muenchen in Munich work on the same scope. Details on the rental management page.

Two questions that sort any provider: the tenant who stops paying, and the bank that says no

The provider types above are easiest to tell apart by asking each of them the two questions expat forums ask most, because each type can answer only one of them from experience.

Question one: what exactly happens when my tenant stops paying? The correct answer names the statute and the timeline. Under § 543 Abs. 2 Nr. 3 BGB the landlord may terminate without notice once the tenant is in arrears on two consecutive payment dates with more than an insignificant part of the rent, or once the arrears over a longer period add up to two months' rent. A written termination follows, then, if the tenant does not leave, an eviction claim (Räumungsklage) at the local court. The court phase takes about three to six months in a simple case and in practice often six to twelve months; enforcement by the bailiff adds one to three more. The cost is set by the value in dispute, usually the annual net cold rent, and lands first with the landlord: roughly 1,500 to 2,500 EUR of court and lawyer fees for a small flat, recoverable from the tenant only if the tenant can pay. One rule surprises every foreign owner: under § 569 Abs. 3 Nr. 2 BGB the tenant can cancel the no-notice termination by paying the full arrears within two months of the eviction claim being served, once in any two years. The Bundesgerichtshof confirmed (VIII ZR 307/21, judgment of 5 October 2022) that this grace payment does not undo an ordinary termination issued alongside it, which is why every termination for arrears is sent in both forms. A rental manager answers this from case files. A full-service firm should answer with its own screening standard (income of about three times the rent, SCHUFA, previous landlord), its deposit practice (three months' cold rent, the legal maximum under § 551 BGB) and the reserve it builds into the purchase calculation.

Question two: which loan-to-value does my residency and my credit file actually get, and at which banks? The correct answer is a number and a list. A resident with a German SCHUFA file sees 80 percent and more; an EU resident abroad with no German file sees 50 to 60 percent on LDP's working figures; income in a non-euro currency is discounted by up to 25 percent at some banks; and every bank keeps its own list of countries of residence it accepts. A mortgage broker answers this from the panel. A rental manager cannot. A full-service firm should answer before showing a flat, because the loan-to-value sets the budget.

The protection rules are the third filter. Under § 573 BGB a landlord ends a tenancy only with a legitimate interest, and a higher rent is expressly not one; notice runs three to nine months under § 573c BGB; rent rises within § 558 BGB, at most 20 percent in three years, 15 in tight markets, and new lettings in Berlin, Munich and most large cities sit inside the rent brake of § 556d BGB, now extended to the end of 2029. Any provider whose calculation assumes a sitting tenant leaves or a rent jumps to market has priced a German flat with foreign rules.

A provider that answers both questions with numbers from its own files is integrated. One that answers one well and refers you elsewhere for the other is honest about its type, which is fine as long as you know it. One that answers neither is selling something else.

Full-service investment firms: what under one roof has to include

The phrase is used loosely. For it to mean something, all five of the following have to happen inside one process, in this order, and before the notary date where the step belongs before it:

• Sourcing of existing buildings on the open market, not from a stock the firm already owns.
• A purchase calculation that a named person reviews: price per square metre against the local market, achievable rent, renovation cost, the 15 percent rule under § 6 Abs. 1 Nr. 1a EStG, cash flow after interest and repayment.
• Financing coordination with a licensed broker or under the firm's own § 34i GewO licence, started once the calculation is fixed.
• Tax structure before purchase: land and building split, depreciation basis, renovation timing, the ten-year clock under § 23 EStG, with a tax adviser who signs the return.
• Management set up before the keys, so the tenant search starts on the day of handover and not three weeks later.

Whoever you talk to, including us, ask the same questions and expect written answers:

• What is the fee on each step, and who pays it: the client, the bank, or the seller?
• Who reviews the purchase calculation, by name, and can I see one from a closed case?
• What do you refuse to sell or source, and why?
• Which cities does your own management company cover, and where is it a partner?
• Can I buy remotely by power of attorney, and what do you need from me and when?
• Which clients can I talk to, and where are your published cases with figures?

How LDP Group fits this map

LDP Group is a full-service investment firm in the sense above. It is based in Munich, was founded as a GmbH in October 2024 by founders who were already active in the market before, and has served more than 100 clients, most of them expats buying a first investment property in Germany. The four services run as one process: property sourcing and acquisition, mortgage financing coordination, tax-optimised structuring, and rental management and tenant placement. Founders Nicholas Runtic and Abdelrahman Maged review every purchase calculation.

• What it sources. Existing buildings only (Bestandsimmobilien), co-living conversions and Kernsanierung (full renovation) projects, in eleven cities: Berlin, Munich, Nuremberg, Erlangen, Fuerth, Duesseldorf, Cologne, Stuttgart, Karlsruhe, Frankfurt and Hamburg. Purchase prices start at 100,000 EUR; banks finance most of the price, so this is not a cash requirement.
• Financing. Coordinated with the independent broker FM Zinswerk, more than 400 bank partners, no fee to the client because the bank pays the broker; about four weeks from first call to bank approval. LDP's own § 34i GewO licence is in preparation. Residents of Germany and other EU countries only.
• Tax. The tax structure is set by the tax firm Helm & Partner (Steuerberater) before the notary date, and Helm & Partner also files the returns for clients who engage it; LDP prepares the purchase figures and coordinates, and gives no tax advice.
• Management. Through LDP's own company FairMieten in Berlin and Bremen and vetted partners elsewhere, flat fee from 30 EUR per tenant per month, no percentage of rent, no placement fee.
• Fees. LDP's commission is part of the purchase price: no separate invoice for finding, checking and structuring the purchase, and no additional broker fee (Maklerprovision) on top of the price. Financing coordination carries no fee to the client because the bank pays the broker; management is the flat fee above.
• Plan figures from the business cases of published client purchases (not audited). Average gross yield on the purchase price 2.9 percent at purchase and 5.3 percent planned after renovation, conversion or re-letting, before renovation and purchase costs; planned cold rent 1.9 times the pre-purchase rent on average; first-year tax effect estimated in the purchase calculation, median 21,400 EUR, range 4,800 to 58,320 EUR. These are averages across cases with different cities and building types, not a forecast for yours.
• What LDP does not do. No new builds, no buyers living outside the EU, no tax advice of its own, and usually no listed buildings.

If that fits, the first step is a free 30-minute screening call. If it does not, for example because you want a new build with the 5 percent declining-balance depreciation, or you live outside the EU, one of the other types above is the right place to go.

How to check any provider's track record, including ours

• Client reviews on Google, read for the text rather than the score: do reviewers describe a completed purchase and a let flat, or a pleasant first call?
• Named founders and staff on the site and on the imprint. A firm that will handle a six-figure purchase should be a person you can name.
• Published cases with figures: purchase price, rent before and after, renovation cost, yield, tax effect. Anonymised is fine; absent is not.
• Regulatory status. Anyone brokering a mortgage needs § 34i GewO and should say so on the imprint; a firm that only coordinates with a licensed broker should name the broker.
• An imprint (Impressum) with a German company, a registered address, a commercial register number and a responsible person, as the Digitale-Dienste-Gesetz requires for a commercial site.
• A published list of what they refuse: property types, locations, buyer residencies. A firm that sells everything to everyone has no position to check against.

For LDP: the founders are named above and on the about page, the cases with figures are on this site, the client statements are on the testimonials page, the broker is FM Zinswerk, the tax firm is Helm & Partner, and the refusal list is in the previous section.

Limitations and what we do not know

• Every statement about a named competitor comes from one page of that firm's public website, fetched on 14 September 2026 and read as published. The statements on Expats Invest were re-checked against its website on 15 October 2026. We did not contact any of them, did not test their service and did not read their terms. Offers, fees and licences change; check the site on the day you decide.
• Where a page does not state a fee model, a location or a licence, we wrote not stated. That means the page we read does not say it, not that the firm lacks it.
• LDP Group wrote this page. The section on LDP uses LDP's own service facts and aggregated case figures as of September 2026, which no outside party has audited.
• No ranking is implied. The five types solve different problems, and a reader who needs only a mortgage is better served by a broker than by a full-service firm.
• The fee models in the rental management section are general market practice and not a description of any named firm's pricing.
• We did not fetch any standalone rental management company's website for this page; that row of the table describes the type.

What would change this answer

• A change to any named firm's website that adds or removes a service line, a fee statement or a licence, which we check when the page is reviewed.
• A change to § 34i GewO or to the Immobiliardarlehensvermittlungsverordnung that alters who needs a licence to coordinate a mortgage.
• LDP's own § 34i GewO licence being granted, which would move financing from coordination with FM Zinswerk to in-house brokerage.
• A refresh of LDP's published case figures, which are aggregated again each quarter.
• A change to the arrears thresholds in § 543 BGB, the grace payment in § 569 BGB or the landlord's termination grounds in § 573 BGB, or a further change to the rent brake in § 556d BGB, last extended in July 2025 to the end of 2029.

Last reviewed October 1, 2026. Reviewed by Nicholas Runtic and Abdelrahman Maged, co-founders of LDP Group, before publication and at every review date. We review this page every quarter and re-fetch each named firm's page before the review; if you are reading it more than three months after the date above, treat the competitor descriptions as dated.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

• Hypofriend, English homepage (fetched 14 September 2026)
• Dr. Klein, Mortgage for expats (fetched 14 September 2026)
• Baufi24, Mortgage for expats (fetched 14 September 2026)
• My Mortgage Germany, homepage (fetched 14 September 2026)
• Finance for Expats, Services (fetched 14 September 2026)
• PerFinEx, Real estate in Germany (fetched 14 September 2026)
• Makker Group, English homepage (fetched 14 September 2026)
• Investfriend, English homepage (fetched 14 September 2026)
• Expat Real Estate, homepage (fetched 14 September 2026)
• Expats Invest, Real estate investment (fetched 14 September 2026, re-checked 15 October 2026)
• § 34i GewO, Immobiliardarlehensvermittler (gesetze-im-internet.de)
• § 551 BGB, Begrenzung und Anlage von Mietsicherheiten
• § 556 BGB, Vereinbarungen über Betriebskosten, Abs. 3 annual statement
• § 6 EStG, Abs. 1 Nr. 1a anschaffungsnahe Herstellungskosten
• LDP Group, services and fees
• LDP Group, rental management fee and scope
• FM Zinswerk, mortgage broker
• Helm & Partner, tax firm
• § 543 BGB, außerordentliche fristlose Kündigung (rent arrears thresholds)
• § 569 BGB, Abs. 3 Nr. 2 grace payment after an eviction claim
• § 573 BGB, ordentliche Kündigung des Vermieters (legitimate interest)
• § 573c BGB, Kündigungsfristen (notice periods)
• § 558 BGB, Mieterhöhung bis zur ortsüblichen Vergleichsmiete
• § 556d BGB, zulässige Miethöhe bei Mietbeginn (rent brake, extended to 31.12.2029)
• ImmoScout24, Räumungsklage: Dauer, Ablauf und Kosten (read 21.09.2026)
• KGK Rechtsanwälte, Wie lange dauert eine Räumungsklage in Deutschland (read 21.09.2026)
• BMJV, Mietpreisbremse bis 31. Dezember 2029 verlängert (law in force 23.07.2025)