Russia’s mortgage market has been feverish since the end of the last year, which was accounted for by a number of factors. One of them was the increase of the Central Bank’s key interest rate, which automatically resulted in mortgage loans becoming more expensive. The rates soared by 5-7 percentage points or even more within a week. As a result, at some Banks they exceeded 20%, whereas the down payment also grew. At the same time, Banks stepped up their requirements both to consumers (up to and including annulment of the previously approved mortgage applications) and to developers (close attention to the construction phase in order to combat freeze of construction in progress). Naturally, this took its toll on the demand, because the rate in excess of 15% is already restrictive for the consumer in itself.
Considering the existing reality, the state assumed market regulation functions. As a consequence, in March state subsidies program was launched, which was joined by many major Banks. The mandatory condition for participation in the program for consumers was acquisition of housing from legal entities and in residential complexes that are being or have been built under 214-FZ “On participation in the funding of construction of apartment blocks”. State support gave an impulse to mortgage market pickup and returned the mortgage rates to the pre-crisis level and in some cases even made them more attractive.
According to the Head of RDI’s Mortgage and Partner Relations Department Rustam Azizov, “thanks to the introduced program of state subsidies, the market at present has stabilized at the following level: the down payment is at least 20%, the rate does not exceed 12%, the credit period is up to 30 years, the maximum credit amount for such offer makes up 8 million roubles for Moscow, Saint Petersburg and Moscow Region, for other regions - 3 million roubles”. Some Banks have offered a “bonus” of their own by deducting another 1 to 0.5 points from the rate. Therefore, it is worthwhile spending more time on shopping around for existing options.
RDI cooperates with many Banks, finance institutions participating in the state subsidies program and gives plenty of room for maneuver to its customers.
Certainly, we are not yet out of the wood with this crisis, but all experts agree unanimously that the market is picking up thanks to the launch of the state subsidies program and the rate reduction that followed on the back thereof. RDI’s specialists confirm this by the fact that since March a stable growth of the number of mortgage applications has been seen.