In the course of yesterday’s meeting devoted to top-priority national projects Governor of Chelyabinsk Region Petr Sumin requested GD of South Ural Mortgage Lending Agency JSC Alexander Kondrashov to set up a subsidiary in Magnitogorsk. According to Mr Sumin, the Accessible and Comfortable Dwelling to Russian Citizens program is one of the most important issues today. Only one in ten people can improve his or her living conditions; this number will have tripled by 2010, but this is obviously not enough. One factor at fault is the housing shortage. Over 1.7m square meters of dwelling were put up in 1987, with only 500,000 to 600,000 in the late nineties, said Mr Sumin. This created a deficit of over 15m square meters whereas the number of those needing homes kept growing.

That is why Magnitogorsk needs a mortgage-lending program so badly.

Deputy Mayor Viktor Khramtsov reported that the local authorities had already held negotiations with some banks, which yielded positive results. He said that 1,300 apartments had been bought via mortgage lending in 2005, and 2,500 apartments would be acquired in 2006.