New approaches in solving issues of rented and emergency housing being developed in the Republic of Tatarstan

Today, a round table meeting on the development of rented housing and mechanisms to implement the programs on citizens movement from the failing housing stock on the terms of  renting residential accommodation was held in the Ministry of Construction, Architecture and Housing of the Republic of Tatarstan  with the support of the State Corporation – the Fund assisting the restructuring of Housing and Public Utilities,  “Agency for Housing Mortgage Lending” OJSC and the Fund “Institute for Urban Economics”.  The meeting was attended by Minister of Construction, Architecture and Housing of the Republic of Tatarstan I.E.Faizullin, his deputies, Executive Director of GZhF under the President of the Republic of Tatarstan         T.M. Abdullin, Director General of “Mortgage Agency of the Republic of Tatarstan” OJSC  A.A. Simakov, Deputy Head of the State Public Institution “GISU RT” I.N. Nasyrov and other invited people interested in discussing the issue.

Welcoming the participants Minister I.E. Faizullin noted that it was essential to work out a lot of mechanisms both legal and financial to develop rented housing in the country.  Director of the Department for regional programs of the Fund assisting the restructuring of Housing and Public Utilities O.S.Rurin said that it was time to think about amendments to the law required for the successful implementation of the planned projects.

The report of Director General of the Fund “Institute for Urban Economics” A.S. Puzanov was devoted to the development of rented housing in the Russian Federation. He told about non-commercial and commercial renting. The first one involves the reimbursement of made investments and the cost of maintenance and repair, while the second one involves profit making. According to him, today it is important to work out such financial and economic schemes that would benefit investors. The next part of the report was devoted to a new concept of citizens movement from the failing housing stock which provides housing rights for citizens without home ownership. In accordance with this concept the citizens who live in the failing housing stock are to be divided into those who have any living space in addition to the emergency one and those who do not. The second group can be divided into those who are considered the poor and those who do not refer to the category.

Executive Director for Financing of Housing of “Agency for Housing Mortgage Lending” OJSC A.N.Shelkovy spoke about the development of rented housing sector through the example of regions that had started implementing the project. Rented housing is being constructed in Arzamas city (the Nizhny Novgorod region, the State Enterprise of the Nizhny Novgorod region NIKA is the initiator and the developer). The development of the refinancing transaction of the existing rented housing projects in the Kaluga region is being completed (the owner is “Sberstroiinvest” LLC).

Minister of Construction and Housing of the Novosibirsk Region D.V.Vershinin told about the experience of the implementation of the project “Rented housing” in Novosibirsk city. 280 million rubles were invested in the project including 48.2 million rubles provided as the state support. The major risks of the program included the absence of state regulation of pricing, low solvency of the citizens, lack of benefits both for the developers and the employers.

The participants made a conclusion that the social mortgage program being implemented in Tatarstan since 2005 could be partly referred to the rented housing program as most of the mechanisms had already been used.

The program “Development of rented housing market” included in the integrated program “Housing development in the Republic of Tatarstan in 2011 – 2015” was adopted in the Republic of Tatarstan in 2012.

By 2016 the program presupposes the annual growth in rented housing commissioning up to 420 thousand square meters and in the share of rented housing commission of the total housing commissioning in the Republic of Tatarstan  up to 15% (from 0.7% of the current year)

More than seven thousand families are to be provided with housing due to the implementation of the program.