‘One must admit that the real estate sector is going through a very severe crisis at the moment, so the prices are bound to keep going down. The market players report the actual transaction prices tend to be at least 20% lower than what the sellers initially ask for. I personally feel the figure looks more like 35% or even 40% rather than 20%, since, as everyone knows, the real estate prices used to be a bit of a huge bubble over the last years,’ Accord Invest Investment Company’s Deputy GD Konstantin Selyanin says to UrBC.

Meanwhile, Andrei Gavrilovskiy, the local entrepreneur, announced he was about to sell some 1,300 square meters worth of a penthouse located on the 50th floor of Antey Trade and Business Center’s unfinished third section. The price he asked for comes to 260,000 RUR per square meter.

‘I don’t quite understand just how Mr. Gavrilovskiy decided on the price. If this figure is close to prime cost, this signals the construction process’s enormous inefficiency (unless every brick is covered in gold). A more believable thing, however, is that builders simply think you could sell estate for any sum of money. All in all, it’s very difficult to sell an unfinished building for such a sum. I also doubt that Antey is ever going to be finished at all: the construction process is either halted or stopped altogether. I don’t think buying any unfinished estate is a good idea right now. As for investment purposes, housing isn’t the best way to invest at the moment,’ Selyanin explained.