Moscow apartment sales on the secondary market are starting to improve, with the number of deals in January surpassing precrisis levels, according to data from the local branch of the Federal Registration Service.
Apartment sales in Moscow in January were 46 percent higher than a year earlier, rising to 3,923 deals, from 2,674, the service said. The sales were even higher than in January 2007, when 3,251 deals were registered.
Alexei Shlenov, chief executive of Miel-Brokerage, said the sales activity was unusual for a month filled with holidays, but apartments that had been taken off the market were being put back up for sale.
Of the apartments purchased last month, 495 of the deals, or 13 percent, were financed with a mortgage. Roughly every sixth deal on the secondary market uses a mortgage, compared with every 20th sale in 2009, said Sergei Shloma, a department director at Incom-Nedvizhimost.
"We saw a 48 percent increase in mortgage deals through our agency in December," said Leonid Menshikov, chief executive of the Doki real estate agency.
"For the first time in a year and a half, the number of advances paid is 60 percent of the number of houses placed on the market, while for all of 2009 the figure was at about 40 percent," Shloma said. The renewed demand has led to higher prices for the most liquid properties, such as cheap one-room apartments not involved in swapping deals, which have seen prices rise by 10 percent to 15 percent since September.
The IRN.ru analytical portal noted an insignificant increase in offer prices in December: 0.7 percent in dollar terms (with average prices reaching $4,055 per square meter, from $4,4028) and 0.3 percent in ruble terms. IRN.ru director Oleg Repchenko said price increases within 1 percent were because sellers wanted to compensate for inflation and fluctuating currency exchange rates. During the frenzy in early 2008, prices in Moscow were increasing by 2 percent to 2.5 percent per week, he said.
Menshikov said prices were rising gradually on liquid apartments, such as those near metro stations and those in good buildings with clean entryways and good infrastructure.
Apartments are staying on the market for about six weeks now, down from about three months, Shloma said. Over the past two months, some apartments have been sold within a week of being listed, Menshikov said.
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