How to get a mortgage in Germany

The rights to a real estate property that are held by the person who owns the property (house, land, apartment etc.) are given to a bank in order to receive other benefits in return. These benefits are usually cash benefits. The mortgage is used in banking as security for loans. The possible amount of the mortgage is determined by the value of the property. Mortgages can be given by banks. In case people need help regarding mortgages there are different branches that can help. Mortgage brokers help people to arrange the mortgage between the borrower and lender and a real estate agent helps buyers and sellers find or sell a property. Getting a mortgage has several advantages such as that the interest rates are generally lower than for other types of borrowing and that a mortgage is easy to repay due to it is repaid little by little on a monthly basis. But a mortgage can also be disadvantageous because the interest rates on mortgages are changing from time to time and can increase suddenly o the borrower has to pay more or that the house will be repossessed when the borrower cannot make the repayments.
There are different types of mortgages that people can get in Germany. The three most common types are the adjustable rate mortgage (ARM), the libor mortgage and the fixed rate mortgage. The ARM is the classic form of mortgage with variable and changing interest rate and it has not a fixed term. A libor mortgage has the benefit that there is given a high level of transparency regarding the structure of the interest rate. Interest rate adjustments are made at intervals of three, six or twelve months, depending on the agreement. With a fixed rate mortgage, the interest rate is agreed in advance between the borrower and lender for a fix term. Due to the fixed interest rate the borrower has not to be afraid of increasing interest rates but also cannot benefit from decreasing interest rates.
As I already mentioned before, people get mortgages at banks. For getting a mortgage, the borrower has to give certain documents to the bank. These documents are proof of income from the last twelve months, proof of any savings that the borrower has, documents for the property such as a ground-plan, the age of the object and so on. The bank also proves the creditworthiness of the borrower by looking after records that are made by the General Credit Protection Agency (German:  Schutzgemeinschaft für allgemeine Kreditsicherung, abbreviation: SCHUFA). If the bank finds a negative record the borrower is not creditworthy and not allowed to get a mortgage.