Sverdlovsk Region’s first mortgage was given to the Larionovs, a local family, on November 27, 2003. This mortgage was coordinated by the regional Mortgage Lending Agency and SKB-Bank, thus making the latter a mortgage lending pioneer of the Urals.

Over the next four years, the region’s mortgage market mechanisms grew to be fully functional and made it possible for the local citizens to improve their living conditions. Besides, mortgages keep receiving a great deal of governmental support, which has already led to the interest rates going down a few times. SKB-Bank began with an 18% annual interest rate and only charges 10.75% a year today. Then, the Mortgage Lending Agency’s standards have been edited to make mortgages more affordable to those who want them: no notarial certification is needed now, the upper age limit has been upped, you can now take longer to have your dwelling registered, and the payment period has been raised to up to thirty years.

SKB-Bank offered its customers 4,500 mortgages worth more than 4 billion RUR in 2003-2007. The bank’s mortgage loans are now available in Sverdlovsk Region as well as in Tyumen, Chelyabinsk, Rostov, and Volgograd Regions and Perm Territory.