In which cities have apartments up to 28 square meters become more expensive?
Over the past two months, demand for new apartments up to 28 square meters has increased by 7% in Russian cities. According to experts, the jump was provoked by decisions by the governments of Moscow and the Leningrad Region, which introduced restrictions on the construction of such compact housing in May.
The rapid rise in prices for new buildings, which has been observed since the introduction of preferential mortgages, has forced developers to look for non-standard solutions to maintain demand. Many of them paid attention to the so-called. European layouts, which reduce the transaction budget due to small housing areas. The new format quickly became popular. At the beginning of this summer, almost a quarter of one-room apartments and studios put up for sale in new housing buildings were less than the established standards of 28 square meters. m.
The most compact housing was built in St. Petersburg and the Leningrad region, where the share of micro-housing with an area of up to 28 square meters. m accounted for 33% of the total volume of new buildings. Perm was in second place (30.9%), Ufa was in third — 29.6%. The top 6 also included Moscow (29%), Moscow region (28%) and Yekaterinburg (23.7%).
In May, Moscow limited the construction of compact apartments, where 10.7 thousand studios, one-room apartments and apartments up to 28 square meters inclusive were sold. An exception was made only for projects that managed to receive a positive expert opinion before May 7, 2024. As explained by the Moscow Committee for Expertise, the Housing Code of the Russian Federation does not classify a studio as a type of residential premises, and the minimum area for one-room apartments is set at 28 square meters.
Following the capital, the authorities of the Leningrad Region announced similar measures. From June 1, this region raised the minimum footage in new projects from 24 to 28 «squares».
The Moscow region government approved the minimum apartment area of 28 sq.m. back in 2021. True, the limits applied only to studios in houses intended for relocating people from dilapidated and dilapidated housing. The restriction did not apply to commercial projects.
The wave of restrictions raised in the largest local residential real estate markets expectedly increased the risks for developers operating in other regions of the country. And in order to reduce them, they decided to quickly get rid of small-format studios with the help of special promotions.
According to the managing director of the primary real estate department of Avito Real Estate, Dmitry Alekseev, who together with his colleagues studied the situation in 35 large cities, since mid-May, the most interest in compact housing in new buildings has jumped in Yaroslavl (four times!), Irkutsk (+83%), Krasnoyarsk (+ 43%), Tula (+42%) and Krasnodar (+37%). In Moscow, the demand for such lots, on the contrary, decreased by 7%.
“Against the backdrop of news about the introduction of restrictions on the construction of compact apartments in Moscow, the demand and supply for new small-sized housing has increased throughout the country,” — noted the expert. According to him, the supply of apartments with an area of up to 28 square meters in new buildings over the last two months increased by 21% in 16 cities.
Yaroslavl is also in the lead here — The choice of compact new buildings in this Volga city has almost tripled. Also, supply increased significantly in Ulyanovsk (+74%), Voronezh (+61%), Yekaterinburg (+54%), Krasnoyarsk and Novosibirsk (+44% each). In Moscow, the figure increased by 20%.
The cost of a new apartment with an area of up to 28 square meters. meters on average in the Russian Federation amounted to 5.1 million rubles. The most affordable housing of this format in July 2024 is sold in Saratov (2.2 million rubles), Ulyanovsk (2.4 million rubles), Izhevsk, Voronezh and Yaroslavl (2.7 million rubles each). The most expensive compact apartments are located in new buildings in Sochi (RUB 10.9 million), Moscow (RUB 9.3 million), Kazan (RUB 6.7 million) and St. Petersburg (RUB 5.5 million).< /p>
As for the secondary market, the demand for compact apartments has increased by 6% since mid-May. The most noticeable increase in interest in apartments up to 28 square meters. meters in the old stock was noted in Tula (+43%), St. Petersburg (+33%), Moscow (+30%), Voronezh (+26%) and Novosibirsk (+21%). The average supply for the segment increased by 3% across the country and in 30 out of 35 cities in the study.
The average cost of an apartment with an area of up to 28 square meters on the secondary market in Russia in July 2024 amounted to 3.7 million rubles. The most affordable compact housing — in Ulyanovsk (1.8 million rubles), Izhevsk (2 million rubles), Ryazan (2.1 million rubles), Bryansk and Krasnoyarsk (2.2 million rubles). The highest prices — in Sochi (6.6 million rubles) and Moscow (5 million rubles).
«Russians are ready to vote for a compact format with rubles. Due to the low cost, for many this is sometimes the only available option to improve their living conditions: move away from their parents or move to a more promising city,” — Alekseev concluded.