Against the background of worsening conditions for preferential mortgages, building your own houses has become much more profitable
From January to March, Russians took out 42% more mortgages for the purchase and construction of private houses than during the same period in 2023. The Central Bank reported this. Today you can get a loan for individual housing construction (IHC) — this is how the documents refer to the construction of private houses by Russians — under all types of preferential mortgage programs. MK looked into why citizens love loans for the construction of private houses, why it is more profitable than buying an apartment in a new building and how long this trend will continue.
In the first quarter of this year, banks issued mortgage loans for individual housing construction in the amount of 224 billion rubles, the Central Bank of the Russian Federation noted. This is a 42% increase from January to March 2023. At the financial institute “Dom. RF» confirm the growing popularity of building houses among compatriots, noting that for their construction alone (excluding the purchase of ready-made ones), Russians took out loans in the amount of 149 billion rubles from January to March 2024, which is three times more than the same period last year.
According to Yulia Dymova, director of the secondary real estate department at Est-a-Tet, certain conditions have been created for the growth of the popularity of individual housing construction in Russia. This format began to arouse increased interest initially during the pandemic, when people thought about the need to have a country property in convenient transport accessibility, comfortable for year-round living. “The factor that influenced the development of private housing construction was the remote form of work of employees,” Nikolai Solabuto, an expert on financial markets, continues the topic. “The business has restructured itself, created support for such work, and now people prefer this particular form of work, which has led to the idea of buying or building their own home.”
Then interest in individual housing construction was supported by the development of state support programs. Well, the third and, for many, key factor in the sharp increase in interest in building your own country house was prices. Market analysts point to a noticeable difference in the cost of a square meter of housing, which in individual housing construction averages around 50 thousand rubles, in the secondary market it is about 100 thousand rubles, and in the market of new buildings, where all preferential programs operate, it is three times higher and reaches 150 thousand rubles. “The growth in demand for suburban real estate is the result of inadequately inflated prices in the urban housing market, where the cost of apartments has increased, including against the backdrop of a protracted preferential mortgage program,” says Oleg Repchenko, head of the Analytical Center “Real Estate Market Indicators”. — Today, apartments in Moscow and other large cities are 1.5–2 times more expensive than 3-4 years ago. More or less adequate price for small-sized properties that are poorly suited for comfortable living for a family with children.” In addition, in cities, high building density leads to infrastructure overload, uncomfortable living when it is impossible to park near the house, and so on. Of course, there is an alternative on the market — spacious apartments of 100-150 square meters, but their prices are astronomical. At the same time, outside the city today, within the budget of 20-30 million rubles (including through credit money), you can build or buy a good house for a large family with children at a reasonable distance from Moscow, in an organized village, where there is enough space for everyone and there will be no problems with parking, the analyst notes.
Another factor in the growth in demand for private homes was the worsening conditions for preferential mortgages. Let us recall that the authorities reduced the limit on new buildings from 12 million to 6 million rubles in December 2023, and from that moment on there has been another surge of interest in the construction of private houses, since in large cities it is impossible to buy a normal apartment for this amount. “The state supports the development of individual housing construction: it is beginning to develop distributed infrastructure for locations for private development, and in the near future, a separate preferential mortgage specifically for individual housing construction is expected to appear on the market,” reminds the founder of the construction company Nordhus Alexander Petrov. All these factors will contribute to a further preponderance of interest in favor of this type of housing. According to Repchenko, the popularity of suburban real estate will continue until there is an available alternative in the city market. And it is unlikely to appear, at least as long as demand and, accordingly, prices are artificially maintained.