Page 64 - RUSRptSept18

said. Consumer loans for the first half of the year increased by 9.1% to RUB6.6 trillion and auto loans by 4.5% to RUB745bn.
The issuance of mortgages is booming in Russia , with the volumes of credits issued expanding by 60% y/y in the last 10 months, according to the website Dom.rf, Vedomosti reports on August 13. Using a mortgage to finance a house or apartment has gone from nothing in 2003 when the product first appeared to account for some 60% of funds used, according to industry experts interviewed by bne IntelliNews.
Banks are keen on mortgages, which are one of the most profitable products they can offer. Retail lending has been expanding as well, but concerned by the possible formation of a consumer credit bubble the Central Bank of Russia (CBR) has already moved to cool the lending. Dom.rf estimates that in the last 10 months mortgage credit volumes have increased by 60% or more over the previous year, the website reported. Russians took out mortgage loans worth RUB245bn-255bn ($3.6bn-3.8bn) in July.
In just seven months of this year, about 785,000 mortgage housing loans worth more than RUB1.55 trillion were issued, which is 68% more than in the same period last year, Vedomosti reported.
The total amount of mortgage loans taken out by Russians since the beginning of this year has already exceeded the total of 2016, when loans worth RUB1.47 trillion were issued. Russia is on course to beat its previous record of RUB2 trillion of loans issued in 2017.
The mortgage market is growing primarily due to new loans: in the seven months refinancing accounted for 14% of all mortgage loans. According to the company's forecasts, if stable macroeconomic dynamics persist in 2018, about 1.5mn mortgage loans worth more than RUB3 trillion rubles may be granted, which is 1.5 times higher than in 2017.
64 RUSSIA Country Report September 2018 www.intellinews.com