This house has 720 sq m (7,750 sq ft) and is split into four

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apartments. The current owner, a Frenchwoman, bought the property in the 1970s, when it was nearly in ruins, and refurbished it. The apartments were used for guests; one was rented out.

There are six bedrooms and five bathrooms in total. Each unit has a kitchen, a working wood-burning fireplace and built-in shelving. The biggest apartment is 280 sq m (3,000 sq ft) and includes a wine cellar. The living room has original stone floors and exposed oak beams. There is a pass-through window between the kitchen and dining room. The master bedroom has an en-suite bathroom.

The cellar, which has an arched stone ceiling original to the house, has been converted for wine storage. Three hundred bottles of wine are included in the sale price, along with all the furniture and thousands of antique books.

The house was built in 1614, and occupied by Dutch soldiers during the 30 Years’ War of 1618-1648, according to the listing agent.

The kitchen, bathrooms and heating system need to be updated, the listing agent said. The garden has a pond deep enough to swim in. The property is 7,300 sq m (nearly two acres) in size.

Ruhr, an industrial and agricultural area, is in the state of North-Rhine Westphalia. This house is within the town limits of Hattingen, in the rural neigh­bourhood of Nieder­bonsfeld.

An elementary sc­hool, a bus station and several shops are within walking distance of the house. Essen, 20 minutes away by car, was selected by the European Union as the Capital of Culture for 2010. As a result, the city will host a yearlong exposition and celebration of the arts. Essen has a philharmonic orchestra and thriving theater community. The nearest international airport is 30 minutes away in Dusseldorf.

Market overview

The residential property market spiked after the reunification of East and West Germany 10 years ago, according to Tobias Just, head of real estate research at Deutsche Bank Research. Since then, the market has been flat.

In the past year, Just said, the recession caused a dramatic slow-down in new building permits, but sales volumes and prices have held steady in the country as a whole. David Holländer, a real estate agent for Sotheby’s International Realty in North Rhein-Westphalia, said prices in the Ruhr area had dropped about 5 per cent in the past year, and had plunged, by as much as 30 to 40 per cent, in some parts of northern Essen.

Prices for new apartments in the Ruhr area were about ¤2,200 per sq m ($305 per sq ft) in Essen and 2,800 per sq m ($388 per sq ft) in Düsseldorf at the end of 2008, in the most recent figures availabe to Just. Some houses in the southern part of Essen can cost as much as the most exclusive areas of Berlin and Munich, Holländer said — ¤6,000 per sq m ($832 per sq ft) and up. The most expensive part of Essen is called Bredeney, which surrounds the Villa Hügel, a castle that once belonged to the industrialist Krupp family.

In Niederbonsfeld, this house’s neighborhood in Hattingen, Holländer says ¤2,000 to 2,500 per sq m ($277 to 347 per sq ft) is a typical price for a high-quality house and plot of land. Because it needs to be modernized, Holländer priced this house much lower, at ¤1,042 per sq m ($145 per sq ft).

Buyers in Ruhr

Most of the foreign buyers in the area come from countries in the European Union, according to Holländer, especially the Netherlands, Britain and Poland. Although the current owner of the house profiled here is French, the area does not have many French buyers. “French prefer the southwestern part of Germany,” Holländer said.

Buying basics

“You can assume that there will be costs of about 9 per cent of the purchase price when you buy,” Holländer said.

This includes a negotiable commission of 3.57 per cent, including value-added tax, paid to the real estate agent (the seller pays the same amount).

A transfer tax of 1.5 per cent is paid to the municipality, and an additional 3.57 per cent is paid to the notary who handles the sale,Holländer said.

Taxes and fees

Property taxes on this house situated in Hattingen are about ¤2,200, which is about $3,268 a year.

—International Herald Tribune