The Office for Presidential Affairs overpaid at least $3 million in budget funds for apartments after a mysterious firm entered the only approved bid during a state tender to deliver the property.
The unknown firm Intermarks, which has a charter capital of 10,000 rubles ($340), won the office's tender to deliver 85 apartments for Moscow officials. Intermarks — which is registered with a telephone number used by 192 other firms, according to the SPARKS database — will sell the state about 7,500 square meters of housing for 1.127 billion rubles ($38 million).
According to the tender documentation on Zakupki.gov.ru, all of the apartments should be in one building "or in blocks in no more than two residential buildings" inside the Moscow Ring Road. The buildings should be new, with construction already completed, and the apartments needed to have finished interiors, according to the documentation. The handover was to take place Dec. 20.
The Office for Presidential Affairs had just two offers, one from the construction firm Krost and the other from Intermarks, but the auction commission scrapped the first company's bid for not meeting the tender's requirements. As a result, there was no auction and Intermarks was able to win the contract at the starting price.
The apartments offered in Krost's bid were only 70 percent to 80 percent complete, Viktor Khrekov, press secretary for the Office of Presidential Affairs, told Vedomosti. The company's chief executive, Alexei Dobashin, said he made no effort to contest the tender's results with the Federal Anti-Monopoly Service.
Although the auction was mentioned widely in the media, the number of bidders was "surprisingly modest," Khrekov said.
Mirax Group was not aware of the tender, said Mikhail Dvorkovich, an aide to the builder's president. The commercial director of Capital Group, Alexei Belousov, said his company did not have any properties that matched the terms of the tender.
"It's not easy now to find a large, fixed number of apartments at one address that are almost completed," Belousov said.
The office has signed a contract with Intermarks to purchase 86 apartments at 28/2 Petrozavodskaya Ulitsa (in the Northern Administrative District, near the Rechnoi Vokzal metro station), and the finishing touches are being put on things there now, Khrekov said.
The order was for 20 one-room apartments of 50 to 60 square meters; 35 two-room apartments (70 to 85 square meters); 15 three-room apartments (95 to 115 square meters); and 15 four-room apartments (120 to 140 square meters).
The housing is intended for officials from the presidential administration, the government, staff from both chambers of the Federation Assembly, the courts, the Central Elections Commission and the Audit Chamber, Khrekov said.
The apartments in the Khorvino district cost the state about $5,000 per square meter. The average price in that part of Moscow is $4,000, although when buying wholesale buyers can expect a discount of 30 percent, said Oleg Repchenko, director of the analytical center IRN.ru.
Apartments in the same building on Petrozavodskaya Ulitsa are being offered to the public at $3,700 to $4,600 per square meter, meaning a direct purchase could have saved about $3 million in budget funds.
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