MOSCOW, December 11. /TASS/. Almost 11,000 families and qualified specialists purchased or built own housing under the Arctic Mortgage preferential housing loan program, where every fifth recipient is a doctor or teacher, press service of the Ministry for Development of the Far East and Arctic reported.

"It was exactly a year ago, that the president expanded the Far Eastern Mortgage Program to the Arctic," the press service quoted Sergey Potanin of the Far East and Arctic Development Corporation as saying. "The program has become a popular support measure - in its first year, almost 11,000 loans were issued in the Arctic. Teachers and doctors have taken a fifth of these loans."

According to him, the number of issued Arctic mortgages is bigger than in the program's first year in the Far East. Most loans were issued in the Arkhangelsk, Krasnoyarsk and Murmansk Regions.

"The Arctic Mortgage is an example of a targeted state program aimed at solving very obvious, pin-point tasks. The loan rate of 2% is comparable to an interest-free installment," said Sergey Gordeyko of Rusipoteka.

The Far Eastern Mortgage Program started in 2019. The rate under it should not exceed 2%, the maximum loan is 6 million rubles ($60,000), or 9 million rubles ($90,000) if the apartment is bigger than 60 sq. m. The program has been available to the Arctic residents since November, 2023.