Climate-friendly residential new-build loan (297/298)
An interest-subsidised loan for people and organisations building or buying new energy-efficient homes in Germany, whether to live in or rent out.
Questa opportunità è attualmente disponibile in inglese.
Finance new homes, including eligible planning, construction supervision and sustainability assessment. The loan can cover up to 100% of eligible costs, subject to a ceiling for each dwelling built or bought. Land costs are excluded. If you can reclaim VAT, only net costs qualify for that part of the project. The loan cannot later be increased beyond the amount you applied for.
Choose the building standard with your energy-efficiency expert:
- Efficiency House 55 (EH55): up to €100,000 per dwelling. The expert checks the building against the programme's EH55 energy standard. No lifecycle-emissions assessment or QNG sustainability certificate is required.
- Climate-friendly Efficiency House 40 (EH40): up to €100,000 per dwelling. Calculated annual primary-energy demand must be no more than 40%, and heat loss through the building's outer surfaces no more than 55%, of the statutory reference building. The building must also meet the programme's greenhouse-gas limit across its lifecycle, assessed from construction through use and eventual disposal.
- EH40 with QNG: up to €150,000 per dwelling. In addition to the EH40 and lifecycle tests, an accredited body must certify compliance with QNG-PLUS or QNG-PREMIUM. This checks wider sustainability requirements, including materials and accessibility. The associated advice and certification can also be financed.
You repay the loan with interest and provide security agreed with your financing partner. Terms range from 4 to 35 years. Depending on the option, you initially pay only interest for one to five years, then make equal monthly payments covering interest and debt. Alternatively, a 4–10-year loan can be repaid in full at the end, with interest paid monthly beforehand. The federal interest subsidy lasts for the initial fixed-rate period, up to ten years; a later renewal is not subsidised. Early repayment is permitted only for the whole outstanding loan and carries a compensation fee; partial extra repayments are excluded.
Undrawn money attracts a fee of 0.15% a month from month 13 after approval. Once drawn, money must be used for its approved purpose within twelve months or an interest surcharge applies. For private DIY work, only directly related materials qualify, with the expert confirming costs and proper execution.
Eligibility
- Programme 297 is for individuals who will live in the financed home. Programme 298 covers non-occupying individuals, condominium owners' associations, civil-law partnerships, sole traders, freelancers, companies including municipal companies, nonprofits including churches, and other eligible public- and private-law bodies. Entities majority-owned by a German state qualify only when the project performs municipal tasks.
- Federal and state governments and their institutions, federal-majority entities and political parties are excluded. So are applicants with insolvency proceedings requested or opened, or who have made or must make an asset declaration under §807/§802c ZPO or §284 AO. Municipal territorial authorities, their legally dependent enterprises and equivalent municipal associations use programme 498 instead.
- The home must be in Germany, fall under the German Building Energy Act (GEG), and be intended for permanent residential use. A first purchase must occur within twelve months of formal acceptance of the building work. A purchase artificially split into land and construction contracts is excluded where a single contract subject to the German developer rules could have been used.
- For EH55, a valid building permit must exist at application. If no permit is required, the authority must already know of the project and construction must legally be allowed to begin. Fossil-fuel heating is excluded; biomass heating is permitted. The pre-application permit requirement does not apply to EH40.
- For EH40, the building's heating equipment cannot use fossil fuels or biomass, including in hybrid systems. A network supplying up to 16 buildings and 100 dwellings may obtain up to 30% of annual heat from these fuels if it serves at least one building built before 1995 or with a building application before 1 January 1995. Other heat networks are not subject to this fuel restriction. A biomass room stove is allowed only if it is not needed to meet the heating load and is excluded from the building's energy calculation.
- EH40 air-source heat-pump outdoor units must meet the programme's noise requirement: from 2026, at least 10 dB below the EU 813/2013 limits. Heat pumps must support automated grid-responsive operation and smart-meter-gateway connection; from 2027, only natural refrigerants may be used.
- Keep the building in residential use for at least ten years. Tell a buyer about the funding, continued-use duty and prohibition on worsening energy performance. Report changes of use, abandonment or demolition immediately; KfW may reclaim part of the support.
- Land purchases, refinancing completed projects and repeated KFN support for the same home are excluded. Beyond buying one dwelling for your own occupation, the related-party transfer exclusions cover connected companies, companies and their shareholders or associated persons, and arrangements circumventing these rules. They also cover transfers within or resulting from a Betriebsaufspaltung: an arrangement separating the asset-owning business from the operating business, with common control and essential assets rented or leased between them. Transfers between close persons as defined in §138(1), points 1–3, of the German Insolvency Code are excluded too; this includes spouses and civil partners.
- Do not combine this loan with the federal efficient-buildings programme (BEG) for the same measure, or with Home ownership for families (WEF) or low-price climate-friendly residential construction funding (KNN) for the same dwelling. The same costs cannot also receive NKI cooling/air-conditioning support, KWKG combined-heat-and-power support, EEG renewable-energy support or BEW heat-network funding. Other combinations must stay within eligible costs.
- For a building with several dwellings, 298 can cover all units, or a self-occupied unit can have a separate 297 application and expert confirmation. A house with an ancillary apartment or a semi-detached house can use one 297 application for both units if you occupy at least 50% of the units.
- If you cancel an existing loan approval under 297/298, 296 or 300 before KfW pays its financing loan to your intermediary, an EH55 application for the same property must wait six months. The relevant payment is from KfW to the intermediary, not from the intermediary to you. After KfW makes that payment, switching from EH40 to EH55 is excluded. If you cancel an EH40 approval before that payment and reapply for the same property and tier, you must also normally wait six months, unless the project is new or materially changed.
How to apply
- Stato
- chiude 31 dic 2026
- Chiude
- Restrizioni del bando
- EH55 only: application must reach KfW by 31 December 2026 at the latest. May close earlier if funds are exhausted.
- Appoint an energy-efficiency expert from the federal residential-building expert list. The expert checks the design and prepares the Bestätigung zum Antrag (BzA), the technical confirmation you sign for the application. Normally, neither the expert nor their employer may have direct or indirect ownership, shareholding or employment links with the contractors or suppliers doing the work. Those contractors or suppliers must not commission the expert or pay them for referrals. You must commission the expert separately, and their services must be invoiced separately. The programme allows experts to supervise their own homes and developer-employed experts to assist first buyers. An expert claiming their own work on a private home needs a proper invoice from their firm. For QNG, also involve a sustainability adviser and certification body.
- Take the signed BzA to a financing partner, such as a bank, savings bank, building society or insurer. The application must reach KfW, not just your bank, before you sign construction supply/service or purchase/developer contracts. Planning and advice can happen earlier.
- If signing a contract earlier, it must contain a condition making it dependent on funding approval; you cannot add the condition afterwards. KfW must still receive the application before on-site construction or the first purchase payment, including a deposit. Use the contractual wording on the official product page. Starting after application but before approval is at your own risk; support depends on available funds and is not an entitlement.
- EH55 has another route for works contracts: hold a funding consultation with the financing partner or intermediary before signing and record it on Nachweis eines Beratungsgesprächs, form 6000004806, supplied by the partner. Apply before on-site works start. This exception does not cover purchase or developer contracts. For an EH55 first purchase, both the purchase contract and on-site construction must be no earlier than 16 December 2025, and no purchase payment may precede KfW's receipt of the application.
- For loans of €700,000 or more, award work competitively to capable suppliers on economical terms, obtaining at least three offers where possible and retaining the decision records. After completion, submit the expert's Bestätigung nach Durchführung (BnD), confirming costs and completed work, through your partner promptly and no later than 36 months after full loan disbursement. QNG certification must be evidenced where applicable. Pay invoices without cash and keep the required project and payment records for ten years after loan approval.