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First Arctic Mortgage loans to be issued in December

For single-industry towns, for the limited-access (closed) territories, for individual houses on the Arctic hectares applicants would be allowed to buy housing on the secondary market, Alexey Chekunov noted

MOSCOW, November 24. /TASS/. The first loans under the preferential mortgage program in the Arctic will be issued in December, Minister for Development of the Far East and Arctic Alexey Chekunov told the Federation Council members.

"The first loans are due in December, 2023," he said during a meeting on Development of the Far East, Arctic and Antarctica at the Federation Council.

"The loan amount is 6 million rubles ($68,000). We are starting deliberately with <…> the restricted marginal price at which a square meter of housing is sold under the Arctic Mortgage Program. The reason is to prevent a sharp price surge, to create an incentive to lower prices, to stimulate efficient developers," the minister said.

For single-industry towns, for the limited-access (closed) territories, for individual houses on the Arctic hectares applicants would be allowed to buy housing on the secondary market, he continued.

"We have calculated apartment-by-apartment what demand could be - about 7,000 families fit the current framework," the minister said.

About mortgage

Earlier, Russian President Vladimir Putin told the government to launch a preferential 2% mortgage program for young families in the Arctic by November 1. The program in the Arctic should contain the conditions of the existing Far Eastern Mortgage Program. Further on, the president asked the government to extend the preferential mortgages to employees of the defense-industrial complex in the Far East and in the Arctic.

The Far Eastern Mortgage Program has been operating in Russia since late 2019. Under the program, applicants may take a housing loan for newly built or for secondary housing at a rate of 2% for up to 20 years. The program has boosted the demand for new flats, and the construction in the Far East has doubled from earlier 2.1 million sq. m.

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