Miory Regional Executive Committee
President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko signed decrees on March 6 aimed at improving approaches to the procedures for housing construction and financing. This was reported to BELTA by the press service of the Belarusian leader.
Decree No. 95 "On State Support in Housing Construction" was adopted with the aim of creating a single regulatory document on providing state support to citizens for improving their living conditions. It consolidates all existing forms of such support in the country.
The amounts of state support are maintained at the current level. The categories of persons entitled to it (all civilian and military personnel), as well as the procedures and conditions for its provision, remain unchanged.
The decree provides for three forms of state support for housing construction or purchase:
preferential loans for the construction of single-family residential buildings, apartments in block-built residential buildings, as well as for the purchase of single-family residential buildings, apartments in multi-apartment or block-built residential buildings constructed under state order (21 categories of citizens);
one-time subsidies for housing construction or purchase (17 categories of citizens);
state financial assistance for repaying debts on preferential loans (for large families and young families upon the birth of children).
Certain categories of citizens may be eligible for all forms of state support.
Among the key innovations of the decree is the exclusion of citizens from participation in shared construction processes and the provision of preferential loans exclusively for the purchase of apartments in multi-apartment residential buildings constructed under state order (while for individual residential buildings, financing for construction and purchase remains in place). Furthermore, subsidies for repaying principal and interest on commercial loans for housing construction are replaced by preferential loans.
In settlements with a population of up to 20,000 people, preferential loans will be provided for the purchase of housing both on the primary market (constructed under state order) and on the secondary market.
Decree No. 94 adopts the Decree of May 8, 2013 in a new editionof the year No. 215, which introduced the state order mechanism for housing construction.
The essence of the state order is that the construction of residential buildings is carried out by state customers (UCCs and other state organizations) without involving citizens during the construction phase. A preferential loan for the construction of a residential building is granted to the customer organization. Following the commissioning of the building and the conclusion of purchase and sale agreements with citizens, the debt on preferential loans is reassigned to the citizens.
The Decree provides for the possibility of constructing part of the apartments in a multi-apartment residential building under a state order and part of the apartments at the expense of budget funds for allocation to citizens as rental and social housing.
Among the new provisions is also the sale of housing constructed under a state order to all citizens registered as requiring improvement of living conditions (currently limited to those entitled to state support).
All amendments enter into force on June 1, 2025. State support for residential buildings whose construction commenced prior to the specified date will continue to be provided under the existing terms.