The state cost guide values carry different reference areas
Funding for school building projects in the German states works to Kostenrichtwerte, cost guide values, set by school type. These guide values are public, precise and directly relevant in practice.
They carry one property, however, that comparison almost always overlooks: the reference area differs from state to state. Comparing two state figures without conversion is therefore worthless.
| State | Reference area of the guide value | Indicative order of magnitude |
|---|---|---|
| Rhineland-Palatinate | approved Hauptnutzfläche (principal usable area) | primary schools around €4,853, secondary around €5,288 |
| Bavaria | eligible usable area under the allocation directive | in the order of €4,297 per m² |
| Saxony | programme area under the model schedule of accommodation | historically around €2,454 per m² |
These figures are not comparable with one another, and still less comparable with a benchmark per square metre of gross floor area. Principal usable area, eligible usable area and programme area are each a subset of gross floor area, and a considerably smaller one. A guide value of €4,850 per square metre of principal usable area corresponds to a substantially lower amount per square metre of gross floor area.
Added to which, the guide values cover different cost groups depending on the state. The Bavarian system captures all eligible costs within the guide value, including elements of cost groups 200, 500 and 700, while other systems are drawn more narrowly. And the figures are given sometimes gross and sometimes net of tax.
Practical rule for education projects: a cost guide value is a funding ceiling, not a cost forecast. It answers the question of what is eligible for support, not what the building will cost. In education work those two figures routinely diverge.
Why education building costs more than general benchmarks suggest
Professional feedback from grant appraisal of schools and nurseries documents that actual cost benchmarks in school building sit consistently above the values in general datasets, in the order of around a quarter. Figures around 4,000 euros per square metre and in part above are cited.
The reasons are well established and structural. They apply to every state alike.
A school is not a plain functional building. School buildings are points of identification in their neighbourhoods and are used outside teaching hours by clubs, groups and residents. That feeds into design ambition, robustness and specification.
All-day operation generates additional area. Dining hall, kitchen, common areas and quiet spaces are added to the classic schedule of accommodation.
Requirements for interior environmental quality are high. Reverberation times are governed by standard and demand absorbent ceilings and wall surfaces. Lighting follows its own standard requirements. Neither is a specification choice; both are matters of demonstrable compliance.
The whole-life perspective dominates. Public building works on the principle that capital cost must not be saved at the expense of running cost. That leads to higher-grade components with longer service lives and to higher initial investment.
The building services share
In school building the share of cost group 400 within building cost runs, on practitioner feedback, at around 31 per cent and reaches up to 40 per cent depending on the building concept. Comparable orders of magnitude are cited for nurseries.
The drivers are ventilation plant, increasingly with peak-load cooling in response to rising summer temperatures, heat pump strategies, generously sized photovoltaics, and lighting and media technology. They all fall within the technical installations cost group.
This is the single most important reason why benchmarks from older education buildings do not transfer. A school building from the 2000s carries a plant scope not comparable with today's. Updating with the construction price index corrects the price level, not the plant scope. The framework is set out in the article on the cost scope of a benchmark.
Refurbishment rather than new build
A substantial share of German education building concerns not new construction but a maintenance backlog accumulated over decades. New build benchmarks do not transfer to it, and dispersion on refurbishment schemes is markedly wider.
Costs run lower where existing fit-out elements can be retained and where structure and circulation are preserved. Documented refurbishment schemes have come in below the applicable cost guide values by that route.
They run higher where the building must be brought to a current standard: fire safety, accessibility, acoustics, ventilation and the thermal envelope all have to be created essentially from scratch in stock from the 1960s and 1970s. Contamination investigation is added for buildings of certain construction periods, with an uncertainty that only falls late.
The third case is the most expensive: converting buildings never constructed for teaching or childcare. Neither new build nor refurbishment benchmarks apply here, and a project-specific assessment has no alternative.
What drives the range item by item
Published figures for education buildings run from about 2,500 to 5,000 euros per square metre of gross floor area. Five factors explain most of that.
| Factor | Effect |
|---|---|
| Sports facilities | a sports hall shifts the total investment substantially and carries its own benchmarks |
| Dining hall and kitchen | production kitchen or servery differ markedly in plant and area |
| Specialist rooms | science rooms and workshops carry use-specific installations |
| Energy standard | passive house or certification requirements act on envelope and plant |
| Construction method | modular and timber construction shorten the programme considerably, with a different cost structure |
The first point weighs most. Sports provision is frequently the largest single lever on an education scheme, and alternative outdoor concepts can cut the cost of that component drastically. For cost estimating it follows that the school building and the sports hall are to be calculated and reported separately. A total benchmark for a scheme with a sports hall does not transfer to one without.
Nurseries
The same principles apply to nurseries at smaller scale, with three particularities. They explain why the benchmark per square metre sits above that of schools.
The fixed cost share per childcare place is higher, because kitchen, sanitary areas, staff rooms and circulation fall on a small floor area. Cost per childcare place therefore belongs alongside the area benchmark.
Requirements for sanitary and hygiene areas are above average, as are requirements for external works, which for nurseries form a cost block of their own within cost group 500 and are precisely not inside the building cost benchmark. Both weigh more heavily on a small footprint than in school building.
And a substantial share of nursery places is created within existing buildings not constructed for childcare. Dispersion on such schemes is markedly wider than in new build, because structure, fire safety and accessibility must all be reassessed from scratch.
Related articles
The orders of magnitude given are indicative values for Germany. They do not replace a project-specific cost estimate and vary considerably by school type, schedule of accommodation, plant standard, state and market conditions.