Office figures: JLL, Cologne office market Q2 2026 — vacancy 5.0%, up 30 basis points on the year; take-up 73,100 m² in the first half. Map built 2026-10-09.
Every building a record says stands empty, one point per building: filter by type, size and how sure the evidence is, and open one to see who says so. “Opportunities” switches to the co-op lens: public land, conversion potential and projects already under way, every source as its own layer.
0 empty buildings · colour = type, dark ring = confirmed
Check any building in Cologne: could it become homes, and could the EHC model work there?
Buildings with evidence that they stand empty — a second source agrees, a public record names them, or we have checked them — ranked by a score you can read: co-op scale, daylight depth, a station nearby, a zone that allows homes, affordable land and an open route in. Checked buildings carry their result; nobody has visited them on site yet. Leerstandsmelder reports join the list when they sit in a large non-residential building and a second source agrees.
| Priority | Building | Floor area | Depth | Station | Conversion check | Actions |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 81 | Perlengraben 101 On public land · Schule · 3 storeys · 6 other sources nearby | 4,002 m² | 12.8 m | 688 m | A fit only | |
| 78 | Laurenzplatz 1-3 On public land · Verwaltungsgebäude · 2 other sources nearby | 6,225 m² | 20 m | 490 m | A fit only | |
| 73 | Spanischer Bau (Rathaus) On public land · Verwaltungsgebäude · 1 other source nearby | 16,680 m² | — | 493 m | — | |
| 63 | Leyendeckerstr. 2c WE 61040 On public land · Wohngebäude · 4 storeys · 1 other source nearby | 3,804 m² | 13 m | 573 m | A fit only | |
| 63 | Kita im Hinterhaus Pallenbergstr. 24 On public land · Kindertageseinrichtung · 1 other source nearby | 3,384 m² | 14.6 m | 1,452 m | A fit only | |
| 63 | Adolf-Fischer-Straße 1 On public land · Schule · 1 other source nearby | 4,089 m² | 29.8 m | 372 m | A fit only | |
| 63 | Leonhard-Tietz-Straße 1 On public land · Verwaltungsgebäude · 2 other sources nearby | 11,552 m² | 17.5 m | 1,086 m | A fit only | |
| 61 | Wiener Platz 4 84647 On public land · Großmarkt · 7 storeys · 1 other source nearby | 10,423 m² | 21.3 m | 651 m | A fit only | |
| 61 | Schaurtestraße 1 On public land · Schule · 3 storeys · 1 other source nearby | 4,449 m² | 22.7 m | 733 m | A fit only | |
| 58 | Former KHD site, Kalk — building flagged unused (Hallen Kalk area) Flagged unused in the cadastre · 3 storeys · 1 other source nearby | 5,774 m² | 33.7 m | 403 m | A fit only |
Of 58 Leerstandsmelder reports on the map, 58 sit in a building we can identify — 37 of them homes. Most are single flats or buildings below co-op scale. These are whole buildings of flats that people report empty, ranked by a reactivation score: co-op scale, whether the whole building is empty, how recent the report is, location and land. A building of flats needs no change of use. Reports are public and not checked by us — each card links to its entry on Leerstandsmelder.
| Score | Building | Floor area | Reported | Actions |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 83 | Kyffhäuserstraße 26 Apartment building · 5 storeys · Whole building · 3 records | 1,180 m² | Nov 2023 | |
| 62 | Zülpicherstr 335 Apartment building · 4 storeys · Whole building | 696 m² | Jun 2022 | |
| 48 | Friedrich-Engels-Straße 7 Apartment building · Extent not stated | 3,066 m² | Apr 2022 |
Where empty offices, the right zoning and a working neighbourhood come together — and what could go wrong.
Historic industrial halls the city wants to hand to a developer, on the former KHD site where the cadastre flags a large building as unused.
Risk: Halls 76 and 77 are structurally damaged; the procedure favours a developer, so a co-op needs a partner.
Large central buildings flagged unused in the cadastre and a department store whose closure was announced.
Risk: High land values; owners may wait for commercial tenants.
The city's first plots offered to a co-operative building group, on a ground lease at a fixed price.
Risk: New build; the 2025 procedure is closed.
Who controls the space, and what a housing cooperative can actually do with them.
Grants housing land preferably on 80-year ground leases, by concept rather than price, at 1.5% ground rent for the first 60 years if 30% of homes are subsidised and 20% price-capped. Watch its tenders and ask for buildings, not only plots.
The city plans to find a developer for halls 75–77 after a Europe-wide market sounding. Join a developer or a foundation as the housing partner.
Owners must report homes not lived in within six months of falling empty, and the city can order them back into use; a new Wohnraumschutzsatzung was adopted on 29 June 2026. Offer owners facing a return order a co-operative lease.
Decisions, auctions and closures that change what becomes available, and when.
The July 2026 edition of the NRW cadastre records 467 Cologne buildings as unused and 9 as ruined; 180 have a footprint of 150 m² or more.
Take-up in the first half of 2026 was 73,100 m², well below average.
The council adopted a new Wohnraumschutzsatzung; the city asks owners to report homes not lived in within six months of falling empty.
The city told the Bund der Steuerzahler in June 2025 that the adult-education plan for the restored manor house in Dellbrück had failed and that it was examining other uses and a sale.
2.5% of 549,815 homes stood empty in May 2022; only 1.2% were available to let within three months.
Two plots at Poller Damm on a ground lease at a fixed price, judged on concept.
After buying the 'Rossio' office building, the city plans to give up the rented east building of the Stadthaus Deutz when its lease ends in early 2029.
25 sources connected, 1 waiting for access. We only use data we may lawfully reuse; where a publisher blocks automated access we do not work around it — a person downloads it, or we ask for permission.
| Source | Access | Records | Status | Licence |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Federal property for sale (BImA) Bundesanstalt für Immobilienaufgaben (BImA) Live sales of federal buildings and land (the open API behind the BImA property search; rentals, garages and parking left out). A disposal is an open route in; it does not say the building stands empty. | Open API | 0 | Live 2026-10-09 | No licence stated — public sale offers, credited to the BImA |
| Forced auctions of commercial property (zvg-portal) Justizportal des Bundes und der Länder Non-residential objects only; shown until the hearing date. Hamburg courts do not publish here. | Open API | 0 | Live 2026-10-09 | Official public notice (§ 39 ZVG) |
| OpenStreetMap disused/abandoned tags and brownfields OpenStreetMap contributors | Open API | 272 | Live 2026-10-09 | ODbL 1.0 (© OpenStreetMap contributors) |
| Rail, S-Bahn and U-Bahn stations (OpenStreetMap) OpenStreetMap contributors | Open API | scoring | Live 2026-10-09 | ODbL 1.0 (© OpenStreetMap contributors) |
| Building heights: GlobalBuildingAtlas (TU Munich) Zhu, X. X., Chen, S., Zhang, F., Shi, Y., Wang, Y. (2025), Technical University of Munich GlobalBuildingAtlas: an open global and complete dataset of building polygons, heights and LoD1 3D models. Earth System Science Data 17(12), 6647–6668, doi:10.5194/essd-17-6647-2025. Read from the Parquet copy on Source Cooperative. Satellite-derived heights (typically 1.5–3 m error in Europe), turned into storeys with storey heights fitted on Berlin; used only where no register or official 3D model sizes the building. | Open download | 118 buildings sized | Live 2026-10-09 | CC BY-NC 4.0 (heights); footprints from OpenStreetMap and Microsoft: ODbL |
| Heights: 3D building models LoD2 (North Rhine-Westphalia) Bezirksregierung Köln, Geobasis NRW © Geobasis NRW (Datenlizenz Deutschland – Zero – Version 2.0). The models record no storeys, so the eaves height (lowest roof edge − ground, tallest part) is turned into storeys. Read per building from the state’s OGC API (CityJSON); the same model as the 1 km CityGML tiles on opengeodata.nrw.de. robots.txt: none on ogc-api.nrw.de (9 Oct 2026). | Open API | 2,068 buildings sized | Live 2026-10-09 | Datenlizenz Deutschland – Zero 2.0 |
| Road noise (EU Environmental Noise Directive, Lden) European Environment Agency | Open API | scoring | Live 2026-10-09 | EEA standard re-use policy (attribution) |
| Leerstandsmelder.de — public reports of empty buildings Leerstandsmelder (Gängeviertel e.V., Hamburg) Shown while we ask Leerstandsmelder for permission. Reports since 2016 only, with the address, the month reported and a link to each entry; not checked by EHC. Each point says when a report has since been marked demolished, lived in, in interim use or rebuilt on Leerstandsmelder, and the owner type the reporter gave (private owners are never named). | Asking for permission | 58 | Live 2026-10-09 | Credited to Leerstandsmelder.de; asking for permission |
| Open-ended property funds: buildings they report partly empty Open-ended real-estate funds (each point names its fund and report) German and Austrian open-ended public property funds must list every property with its vacancy (or letting) rate in their annual and half-year reports. scripts/reuse/import-fund-reports.ts reads those lists; properties at 10 % vacancy or more are shown, those at 25 % or more count as evidence. | Open download | 3 | Live 2026-10-09 | Published fund report (KAGB / KARBV property list), cited per point |
| Co-working spaces, department stores, banks, hotels and cinemas listed as permanently closed Overture Maps Foundation (closure data: BrightQuery company records) Places with operating_status "permanently_closed" in the monthly Overture release, read by scripts/reuse/import-overture-closures.ts and matched to the building they sit in. A closed business is usually one unit; names are shown only for companies, never for sole traders. | Open download | 0 | Live 2026-10-09 | CDLA Permissive 2.0 (Overture Maps Foundation) |
| Land without current use and stalled construction, mapped from satellite imagery (Copernicus Urban Atlas 2006–2018) European Environment Agency — Copernicus Land Monitoring Service Urban Atlas class 13400 (brownfields, demolition sites and gaps in the built-up area, 0.25 ha and up) compared across the 2006, 2012 and 2018 editions, so each plot says how long it has stood unused; plus construction sites (13300) already under way in 2012, and 2012 construction sites left unused by 2018. Read from the EEA's open ArcGIS services, the same way in every radar city. The 2021 edition (Copernicus Data Space) drops plots built on since 2018 where scripts/reuse/import-urban-atlas-2021.ts has been run. Points are context, never evidence of vacancy. | Open API | 83 | Live 2026-10-09 | Copernicus open data (© European Union, Copernicus Land Monitoring Service 2006–2021, EEA) |
| Property companies in insolvency, at the property their purpose names Insolvency courts (Insolvenzbekanntmachungen), structured by OpenRegister Companies in preliminary or opened insolvency proceedings whose registered business purpose speaks of land or buildings (scripts/reuse/import-insolvencies.ts, OpenRegister API — the portal itself disallows automated access, so it is never fetched). A company is placed at the street its purpose names; the rest are leads in the admin. An insolvent owner signals a possible sale, not vacancy: weak evidence. | Open API | 0 | Live 2026-10-09 | Official notices (§ 5 UrhG, source credited), via the OpenRegister API |
| Stalled construction and buildings held by insolvent developers EHC research (dated press and court sources per point) Signa, Adler/Consus and other developer insolvencies since 2022 and stalled sites, each with its latest dated status (src/scripts/data/reuse/stalled-projects.json; news leads from scripts/reuse/mine-news.ts are reviewed before they join). | EHC research | 0 | Live 2026-10-09 | Cited publisher per point |
| Church buildings the dioceses and regional churches plan to give up Catholic dioceses and Protestant regional churches (their building plans), via EHC research Buildings a church body’s published building plan or recent reporting names as to be given up, without church funding, for sale or lease, or profaned (src/scripts/data/reuse/church-plans.json and brussels-churches.json). | EHC research | 0 | Live 2026-10-09 | Cited publisher per point |
| Named buildings and sites from EHC research (each with its own source) European Housing Coop research | EHC research | 8 | Live 2026-10-09 | Facts cited to their publishers |
| Commercial listings (ImmoScout24 / immowelt) Scout24 / AVIV Blocked to automated access; we do not work around that. Request drafted in docs/reuse-radar/outreach/. | Asking for permission | 0 | Pending | Proprietary — API or data partnership requested |
| Year built and listing: OpenStreetMap building tags OpenStreetMap contributors start_date / construction_date and heritage / listed_status of the OpenStreetMap outline a record is matched to, where no register answers. Read with the outline match, not a separate query. | Open API | scoring | Live 2026-10-09 | ODbL 1.0 (© OpenStreetMap contributors) |
| Buildings the cadastre flags unused or ruined (ALKIS) Geobasis NRW — Liegenschaftskataster (ALKIS Grundrissdaten, NAS) | Open download | 178 | Live 2026-10-09 | dl-de/zero-2-0 |
| Administration buildings in the cadastre (ALKIS) Geobasis NRW — Liegenschaftskataster (ALKIS), OGC API Features 'lika' | Open API | 151 | Live 2026-10-09 | dl-de/zero-2-0 |
| Buildings for public purposes in the cadastre (ALKIS) Geobasis NRW — Liegenschaftskataster (ALKIS), OGC API Features 'lika' | Open API | 53 | Live 2026-10-09 | dl-de/zero-2-0 |
| Office buildings mapped in OpenStreetMap OpenStreetMap contributors | Open API | 736 | Live 2026-10-09 | ODbL 1.0 |
| Brownfield land (OpenStreetMap) OpenStreetMap contributors | Open API | 73 | Live 2026-10-09 | ODbL 1.0 |
| Buildings of the City of Cologne's building department (Gebäudewirtschaft) Stadt Köln — Gebäudewirtschaft (geoportal.stadt-koeln.de, ArcGIS MapServer) | Open API | 1,443 | Live 2026-10-09 | dl-de/zero-2-0 |
| Gap sites and plots for restructuring (City of Cologne building potentials) Stadt Köln — Stadtplanungsamt, Baupotenziale (WFS, read by scripts/reuse/import-cologne-baupotenziale.ts) | Open API | 210 | Live 2026-10-09 | dl-de/zero-2-0 |
| Federal properties with empty offices or flats (BImA list, 1 Jan 2023) Bundesanstalt für Immobilienaufgaben (BImA) — lists released under the Freedom of Information Act via FragDenStaat (request #269761); read by scripts/reuse/import-bima-vacancy-2023.ts | Freedom of information | 20 | Live 2026-10-09 | No licence stated — official lists released under the IFG and published by FragDenStaat; used with credit to the BImA and FragDenStaat |
| Free offices, shops and halls on the Immobilienportal of KölnBusiness, the City of Cologne's economic development company KölnBusiness Wirtschaftsförderungs-GmbH — Immobilienportal (KIP software, kip.net) | Open download | 18 | Live 2026-10-09 | No open licence. The portal's terms for searchers ('Nutzungsbedingungen der öffentlichen Plattform für Immobiliensuchende', Stand 19.11.2020; accepted by submitting a search) forbid reproducing the site's copyright texts, pictures, photos, videos and graphics (§3) and limit use to the platform's purpose (§2); they say nothing about facts. Only address, use, floor area and availability are kept, with credit to KölnBusiness and a link to each offer — no titles, descriptions, prices, photos, providers or contacts. Terms for searchers accepted on Jonathan Imme's decision, 9 Oct 2026 |
Open data cannot see everything. Tell us about a building in Cologne that stands empty or barely used; once we have checked it, it joins the map under “Reported by visitors (checked)”.
The other radars in the same country and the nearest beyond. All 134 cities in the atlas
The figure on each card: empty buildings on record.