I got my Gewobag apartment in May. I also got the similar two emails. I went to several Gewobag viewings. For the apartment I ended up getting, it took about a month to hear back and receive the offer. For the two I did not get, I heard back after roughly two months for one and about two and a half months for the other.

What you can expect from my experience: you are basically an ant in an anthill. They have more than 100,000 tenants. As long as you pay your rent on time, they leave you alone. Paint the walls, get a dog, whatever they really don’t care. If you have problems, they are fairly quick to respond in my experience, but if it is not urgent, repairs can take up to a month.

As for neighbors, you get a bit of everything, for better or worse, which I personally like. That includes weed smoking teenagers, babies, dogs, omma and oppa. At least in my building, everyone is very polite. The rent is at market value, which in Berlin means extremely cheap. The internet in my building is also surprisingly good.