From the rostrum of the Verkhovna Rada, President Volodymyr Zelensky's promise to launch the Ukrainian Dream program, under which every Ukrainian will be able to get a loan at 5% per annum, including for the purchase of housing, sounded like a bolt from the blue.. " However, until now, no one has been able to explain how the idea voiced by the head of state should be implemented..

The news about the promised reduction in mortgage rates caught by surprise not only ordinary citizens, but also, according to our information, officials from high offices responsible for housing policy. Well, if the state speaks in hints, let's try on our own to find an answer to this question, which is important for hundreds of thousands of homeless Ukrainians..

Commercial banks cannot lend to the population at a rate lower than the discount rate of the National Bank: bankers are not philanthropists, and they will not, and indeed have no right, to distribute money cheaper than the cost of this product in our country.. Recall: the value of money in a country's financial system is determined by the rate of the central bank. Its actual size is now 9%. That is, taking a mortgage at a rate lower than this level in the economic conditions of Ukraine will not work. It is, after all, illegal: Art. 47 of the Law "

In fact, bank credit interest rates are significantly higher than the discount rate of the National Bank, which makes housing loans in our country fantastically expensive, from the European point of view, and unattainable for most Ukrainians.. And no matter how convincingly the officials mumbled the mantra about the need to stimulate the "

How, in this case, a reader in-depth in the housing topic will ask, the program \? The fact is that banks are implementing this project by lending to their clients at a real interest rate, which today ranges from 13 to 18%.. Taking into account the " And the difference between the real lending rate and the 7% promised by the state is compensated to banks by the government through the Entrepreneurship Development Fund. In fact, pumping money from the state budget into commercial structures with dubious economic benefits, but this is such "

But sooner or later, the budgetary resource to compensate the banks may be exhausted or the enthusiasm of officials disappear.. In this case, the families of the recipients of the " The contract was read when it was signed? And the apartment is pledged by the bank....

Taking into account the difficult conditions for an ordinary person to participate in the program, is it any wonder that the " Now the volume of concessional lending is slightly more than one billion hryvnia, and the number of loans issued is 1,274. To understand the scale: banks issued a slightly smaller amount of mortgages only in September. In general, according to the NBU, in January-September 2021, banks issued more than 7.5 thousand mortgage loans for UAH 6.1 billion (possibly, this included " Note that the mortgage market remains highly concentrated: five banks account for up to 90% of new agreements.

Consequently, the Entrepreneurship Development Fund is unlikely to pull another promise from the president, " Then who? The State Fund for Assistance to Youth Housing Construction has the right to lend at a rate lower than the NBU discount rate: according to the charter, this unprofitable institution, whose loan portfolio has reached UAH 2 billion, is already issuing loans at 3% per annum. At the end of 2019, the budget found UAH 200 million, for which they implemented a pilot mortgage project for ATO participants and internally displaced persons. The experiment caused great excitement, but then the authorities suddenly lost interest in housing programs. More precisely, the emphasis has shifted towards the above-mentioned populist projects.

Derzhmolodzhitlo continues to finance the purchase of housing for displaced persons at 3%, but this time for the money of the German government, which issued a non-refundable grant for this in the amount of 25.5 million euros. Where does the money from the Ukrainian budget go

Perhaps an institution created by the Ministry of Finance to better meet the needs of citizens in affordable housing will be able to fulfill the task unexpectedly set by the president - Ukrainian Financial and Housing Company. However, during the year of its existence, the UFZhK (is it not a paradox) did not start working, but taxpayers politely finance the salaries of its officials and other operating expenses of the structure with as yet unproven efficiency.

The government, through the Ministry of Finance headed by Sergei Marchenko, decided to issue domestic government loan bonds (OVDPs) for UAH 20 billion. Of these, the programs of the Ukrainian Financial and Housing Company should be financed - leasing of housing and lending for the purchase of apartments. True, not for everyone, but for certain categories, among which, for example, civil servants. Despite all the respect, not the most socially vulnerable layer of Ukrainians....

The Mirror of the Week analyzed the mechanism proposed by financial officials in the summer. As we predicted, "

In this regard, a few words about economic matters.. Don't worry, you won't need a calculator: everything is clear and so. Bonds for UFZhK issued for 15 years at a rate of up to 13% per annum. And the Ukrainian financial and housing company will issue loans at significantly lower interest rates (possibly at the 5% mentioned by Zelensky). Guess Who Is Compensating For The Difference. To put it mildly, this is an unfavorable mechanism for the state: the financial and housing company will sell or lease apartments today, and we will pay for all this for many years. In addition, starting next year, UFZhK will receive UAH 650 million from the state budget on a quarterly basis as interest on " This money is included in the list of state finances in the article " Both the interest and the debt itself will be paid by our children.. "

Moreover, a considerable part of the UAH 20 billion will go to pay off the debts of the State Mortgage Institution, which is attached to the UFHK: the state-guaranteed obligations of the SMI reach UAH 7.7 billion.. In the first half of this year, the Ministry of Finance has already paid out UAH 1.75 billion on SMI bonds. I don’t want to believe evil tongues that do not rule out that the deep essence of the appearance of a company invented by the Ministry of Finance on the housing market was to control the process of paying off debts of an actual bankrupt from budget funds.

It is not known whether the above arguments worked, whether the annual absence of signs of life affected the Ukrainian financial and housing company. One way or another, on December 2, the government made an unexpected decision: to take away from the Ministry of Finance and SMI, and UFZhK and transfer them to the subordination of the Ministry of Economy. Perhaps the new head of the Economic Ministry, Yulia Sviridenko, will take a fresh look at the housing policy and methods of its implementation and at the same time find a skillful executor for the presidential program "

In the meantime, we have a paradoxical situation:

on the one hand, 2021 turned out to be more generous than ever in the " And in real life, there was no money in the budget for proven housing programs, both in the past and current years, and in 2022. Germans find hundreds of millions for housing for our citizens, but we do not. Wonders?

At the same time, the authorities have time and inspiration to come up with either “remake” companies, or more and more strange ideas about mortgages, which are getting cheaper in Ukraine right before our eyes.. Unfortunately, only in the imagination of an official, and not for a "