The neighborhood I live in here in Hamburg is... a bit dodgy, but it's OK.... and it's changing.  Local businesses are closing up all over.  A couple of months ago, it started with the convenience store across the street shutting down followed shortly after by another nearby convenience store.  A month ago it was a large grocery store a few streets over.  Last week it was the bakery just 2 doors down from my apartment (I'm going to miss that bakery... they made some excellent stuff).  There are abandoned businesses up and down the street.

The vacancy rate in the local apartments also seems to be rising... now there are 3 empty apartments in the building I live in, and it's looking like there will soon be a 4th.  Plus the landlord has stopped pretty much all maintenance and upkeep on the building - I haven't seen the guy who used to clean the common areas for several months now.  He used to be by at least once per week to wash the entry floors, tidy up things, take out the trash bins etc etc.  I have a feeling he doesn't work there anymore... no one has cleaned the entry in a long time, and the trash bins are now just left on the street under my living room windows instead of being returned back to the spot in the back garden of the apartment building.  One of the tennants put the bins back a couple months back, and they were soon overflowing as no one took them out to be picked up on trash collection day.

There is one oddity of sorts though... signs that in at least one case, there is a lot of work being done to rebuild an apartment building, although, I am not exactly sure what it is they are doing. Just down the street is another of many unassuming bland generic brick apartment buildings.  It's the type that is found in pretty much every country in the world... simple, square, and generic.  The builders moved in a while back, taking over the whole street in front of the building plus a small park around the corner.  They spent a week setting up scaffolding, and then proceeded to paint the red brick exterior with a whilte paint.  Over that they are now building up a styrofoam brick wall, attached to the real red brick behind... they are basically wrapping the entire apartment building in styrofoam blocks.  Strange.. not sure exactly what they are doing... but it's a sign that not every building in the area is being allowed to crumble in neglect.