Because in Germany it's a building that my own ancestors, relatives, or family friends may well have owned or inhabited before being forced out.
Putting the war behind us is a good thing. Getting cheaper housing prices because Berlin has never entirely gotten over the war... is not putting the war behind us. In fact, it's capitalizing today on the lingering effects of the war.
I'm German, and spent my teenage years in South Africa. That mostly means that kids at school called me Nazi (I doubt they meant it as badly as I took it) and then when the Berlin wall came down the whole apartheid thing got big in South Africa.
The upshot is that I had quite a chip on my shoulder in my 20's.
I outgrew that. So I'd suggest, if I may be so bold, not to stay stuck in a past you can't change. Don't miss out on what's there now (wherever "there" is for you). Right now Berlin is awesome. I'd be there if my partner didn't have the opportunity of a lifetime as an economist at the Bank of England.
Oh and if you're looking for well paid work in Berlin, brush up on WinRT and go knock on Nokia's door. That company is amazing. Well, the Berlin bunch are.
Don't miss out on what's there now (wherever "there" is for you).
You mean war profiteering of real-estate values? Honestly, you Germans would be much less creepy if you stopped trying to pretend WW2 and the Shoah never happened and everything is totally happy-shiny now. You certainly don't have to apologize anymore, but you could at least have the decency to act uncomfortable about marketing apartments that are available for low, low, low prices (/salesman voice) primarily because their former residents were killed in war and genocide. You're not supposed to personally feel guilty, but you're not supposed to feel upbeat about it, either.
"Stay in gorgeous, perfectly renovated apartments in pre-WWII residential buildings with high ceilings"
You don't see anything disturbing about that sentence? Nothing at all? No somewhat-disturbing suggestion that apartment renters today can happily reap the benefits of dispossession and war?
I don't see anything remotely disturbing about that sentence. On the other hand, I'm disturbed by how readily you condemn other people by something they never said.
I don't mean to be harsh, but if a building that existed at the same time as the war is enough to evoke unpleasant feelings for someone, perhaps Germany is not a great place for that person to be living in general.
Hence why I don't live in Germany. And it's not that the building existed at the time of the war, but that the war is yielding profits in easy real-estate today. What I'm uncomfortable with is war profiteering, done 70 years ex-post-facto.
I'm not sure everyone feels that prewar residences are a good thing. For many of us, it's sort of a reminder of everything that, you know, happened.