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- Complete the setup: in 10 million-plus cities, half of the apartments built have not been sold
Complete the setup: in 10 million-plus cities, half of the apartments built have not been sold
In Russia's 10 million-plus cities, half of the housing built remains unsold. Among them are Krasnoyarsk, Krasnodar, Omsk, Ufa and others. A similar trend was noted by the Central Bank: in the third quarter, such an area for projects with escrow accounts increased by 1.9 million square meters, reaching 81 million square meters. According to experts, developers are building more than they are able to sell. In the future, this may lead to financial difficulties for developers and affect prices. What are the reasons for the current situation and when it may change — in the material of Izvestia.
In which cities did Russians start buying fewer apartments
There are 10 million-plus cities in Russia with high rates of unsold housing, which is twice as many as a year earlier. By the end of 2025, Krasnoyarsk, Krasnodar, Omsk, Ufa, Voronezh, Chelyabinsk, Samara, Novosibirsk, Perm, and Volgograd were at risk of overstocking the housing market. This is the conclusion reached by analysts of the real estate project "Movement.<url>", having studied the market based on the data of the UIC.
According to a study conducted by Izvestia, developers in a significant part of these cities are building more housing than they are able to sell. In the future, this may lead to problems with filling escrow accounts and, as a result, to increased maintenance costs for project financing.
"As of December of this year, 81.7 million square meters remain unsold in Russia. m of housing under construction with a total construction volume of 120.8 million square meters . m is 68% of the total volume," the study says.
The ratio of sales to housing availability decreased by 7 percentage points on average over the year, from 77% to 70%. This is the boundary that developers do not want to cross, the document says.
— The ratio of the sale of housing under construction to its availability shows whether developers have time to sell their housing to minimize the cost of servicing project financing. State Corporation "Dom.The Russian Federation considers the ratio of sales to readiness in the range of 70-80% to be normal for the market. A further decline threatens the fact that developers may have difficulty paying off project financing debts due to the high interest rate associated with insufficient filling of escrow accounts. In other words, the economics of projects will cease to converge," explained Yan Gravshin, head of the analytical center.
The study notes that in the majority of Russian millionaires, the ratio of sales to construction readiness in 2025 was below 70%. Six major cities were located outside the "safe zone" and in 2024 these are Voronezh, Krasnodar, Ufa, Chelyabinsk, Omsk and Samara. By the end of 2025, the list has expanded to five more megacities.: Krasnoyarsk, Novosibirsk, Perm, Volgograd and Tyumen (not a million people).
The growth of unsold housing is also indicated in the data of the latest quarterly report of the Central Bank "On project financing of housing construction in the third quarter of 2025." According to the document, in the third quarter, unclaimed space in all announced projects with escrow accounts increased by 1.9 million square meters, to 81 million square meters. At the same time, the share of sold housing is 32% in housing under construction and 74% in completed facilities.
Izvestia sent a request to the Central Bank with a request to comment on the situation in the construction industry.
At the same time, the Ministry of Construction is rather restrained about the situation. As Nikita Stasishin, Deputy Minister of Construction and Housing of the Russian Federation, told Izvestia, the average sale of housing in Russia, taking into account the commissioning of 2026, is about 60% with a little. According to him, this is indeed less than a year or two ago, but there are objective reasons for the slowdown in construction. He noted that in order not to take out an expensive loan, developers today accumulate money for escrow so that the rate is lower and everything is not shifted to the cost per square meter.
— Here, of course, we see small risks. However, if we study the dynamics in the reports of the Central Bank and the Development Institute "Dom.Russian Federation", in October and November, the volume of cash growth in escrow began to increase, sales rates are growing. We are still very cautious about forecasts, because we see in the structure of the price per square meter how much project financing and loan servicing costs. We believe that there is definitely something to work on," the deputy minister explained.
Do developers see risks in increasing unsold housing
According to developers, the trend with a growing share of unsold housing is expected against the background of a high key interest rate and an increase in the cost of market mortgages. To retain customers, they are actively implementing an installment payment tool.
— The share of installments in the sales structure has more than tripled over the past two years. However, such a mechanism usually implies the need to make significant payments in a short time, which not all potential shareholders can afford. Therefore, consumer activity inevitably decreases relative to the peak values of previous years," Yaroslav Gutnov, founder of SIS Development, explained to Izvestia.
According to him, another problem for developers is that when making installments, escrow accounts receive only the first installment, therefore, project financing rates decrease relatively slowly. This negatively affects the stability of the industry, although it is not so critical, the developer noted.
— Market players as a whole have adapted to the difficult situation. At the same time, the process of gradual easing of monetary policy in the Russian Federation began in June 2025. As a result, pent-up demand has already begun to show up. Accordingly, the balance between sold and sold areas will definitely stabilize as the key rate continues to decrease," Yaroslav Gutnov believes.
The construction industry is faced with a systemic imbalance between the pace of sales and the usual pace of construction. Developers cannot sell as quickly as they used to build, says Maxim Fedorchenko, president of the Association of Construction Organizations of the Novosibirsk Region.
— To ensure that the funds of project financing do not significantly exceed the funds in escrow accounts, it is necessary to slow down the pace of construction, sometimes artificially. On the other hand, there were also imbalances in the sale of apartments. For example, apartments of a large area that have a lower cost per square meter are being washed out of the sale (while developers are not able to launch a new project yet), the industry representative explained.
According to him, all this slows down production processes, reduces their efficiency and leads to an increase in cost. Therefore, despite the growth in the volume of unsold housing, the expert expects further price increases and, consequently, a reduction in effective demand.
The growth in unsold housing is a reflection of demand trends. The longer mortgage rates remain high, the more difficult it will be for developers to find buyers for new buildings, says Ruslan Syrtsov, managing director of Metrium.
— However, this situation can be viewed differently: mortgage market rates have risen to prohibitive levels for a long time — a year and a half ago. At the same time, existing loan subsidy programs were limited. In 2025, there was a slowdown in the economy, and prices for new buildings continue to rise (by about 15% in the Russian Federation as a whole). However, despite all these conditions, the share of unsold housing has not changed dramatically," a business representative told Izvestia.
According to him, in the third quarter of 2024, this area was 77 million square meters, which is only 4 million square meters. m is more than in the third quarter of 2025. The expert also drew attention to the fact that in the Central Bank's report, the total unsold area increased mainly due to the launch of new projects, sales of which have not yet begun. Strictly speaking, it is not entirely logical to call these volumes unsold, because they have not yet been sold, the business representative believes. The future of the market is positive, as almost half of the areas that will be built in the coming year have already found buyers, Ruslan Syrtsov added.
When will the situation change
According to Dmitry Khalin, CEO and managing partner of Intermark Urban Real Estate, the remnants of unsold projects are really growing. One of the reasons is the commissioning of those projects that started back in 2020-2021, where developers were unable to respond to the changing economic situation in recent years, he added.
"After the pandemic, almost all developers did not expect and did not include in the project that demand would not only remain, but would also increase," he said.
At the same time, according to the expert, the situation is critical for the market, but over time it will balance out — today many developers are acting cautiously and bringing significantly fewer new projects to the market. According to Dmitry Khalin, in a year or two, we can expect a shortage of new housing, in which demand will gradually begin to absorb the unsold balances available today.
The sell-out situation is very different from region to region, Natalia Shatalina, CEO of the RedCat new building aggregator, told Izvestia. There are regions where this level was low two years ago, but now it has decreased even more — we are talking about the North Caucasian Federal District. Projects there were sold out by 28% in 2023, last year this level dropped to 21%, and this year it dropped to a record low of 18%.
— In those regions where there is a marked increase in unclaimed square meters, there is a discrepancy between the volume of construction and demand, and it is solvent. This problem can be solved with a reduction in the Central Bank's interest rate and an increase in the availability of mortgages under market programs, the expert believes.
The risks associated with unsold housing are relevant, says Sergey Razuvaev, founder of GMK, co-founder of the Association of Real Estate Market Professionals REPA. At the same time, according to him, the last quarter of this year will be good for developers, as sales have started to grow.
— In the future, the share of unsold housing will not increase so significantly, but nevertheless it exists. This was an expected story, because demand, for example, has decreased by more than 40 percent since the level of 2023 in terms of DDU volume. That is, there was a drop in sales compared to 2023. And by 2024, this drop, according to various estimates, ranges from 7.5 to 12%. This is the reason why such a volume of unsold housing is now hanging over the market," the expert explained to Izvestia.
At the same time, he believes that this story will be balanced next year, as developers are now launching new projects on a smaller scale, clearly understanding this problem.
Probably, it will be possible to achieve a balance by the middle of 2026, Sergey Razuvaev believes. He cited forecast data from the authorities, according to which the reverse situation will be observed in 2027, when the sale of housing will be high and the exposure will be low.
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