Insurers began to offer life insurance when buying housing by installments
Against the background of the development of alternative options for purchasing housing, insurance companies began to offer customers and a new type of insurance. Now not only a mortgage borrower can insure life and health, but also the buyer of the apartment by installments or the tenant of housing with further ransom. Thus, insurers can compensate for income falling from reduction of mortgages. But the Central Bank tightly controls such schemes.
This year, large insurers began to actively offer the life and health insurance of citizens who acquire real estate without using a mortgage. In particular, Sogaz, Rosgosstrakh, Reso-Garantia, VSK, Energogarant, Renaissance Insurance offer customers insurance when the purchase of housing by installments. In addition, Sogaz and VSK work with customers and in the case of rent with subsequent buyers.
Within the framework of insurance, key risks are covered in the insurance of the buyer’s life (death and disability), as well as the risks of loss and damage to the acquired real estate, explain in the VSK. Additionally, the policy may include civil liability insurance in case of damage to neighboring premises, including during repair work, the company notes.
According to insurers, the launch of such a product is associated with the expansion of the options for alternative housing acquisition against the background of high bets on the debt market and tightening the requirements for borrowers.
According to Dom.rf JSC, in March 2025, the average mortgage rate in a new building for its own programs of banks was 27.92% per annum, and 28.41% per annum in the secondary market. According to Tatyana Reshetnikova, deputy head of the mortgage department of the Foodye Agency, now in new buildings, the purchase of housing in installments occupies 30–40% of the total sales, in the segment of finished housing – 7–10%. In January – February 2025, the volume of transactions for the purchase of apartments and apartments in the new buildings of Moscow and the Moscow Region amounted to 22.75 thousand shared participation agreements with a total area of 1.07 million square meters. m, follows from the rating of the Dataflat.ru service. In addition, activation occurred, since there is no competitor in the form of a bank who claimed commission income from insurance, the expert of the mortgage market Sergei Gordeyko notes. According to him, the peak of sales will last the whole 2025, then the share of installments will be reduced, but the share of such insurance will remain: up to 20 thousand such agreements can be concluded monthly.
Developers indicate that such insurance actually becomes a prerequisite for the transaction. “About 70–75% of developers in Russia include life and health insurance in installments. In large cities – up to 90%, ”Leonid Zaykin, the head of the development department of financial products, estimates. And the reason for this situation is the specific risks.
“When installing the apartment, the apartment was actually sold, but the money has not yet been received for it. And if something happens to the client, the developer can be left without money, and the apartment will return to his balance, ”the expert notes.
Such a mechanism is especially relevant for long installments, for three to five years, Mr. Zaykin points out.
At the same time, according to independent expert Andrei Barkhota, insurers were looking for an alternative to income pool and designed a comprehensive insurance product for housing buyers according to an alternative scheme. It allows you to compensate for the drop -down premiums for insurance companies and the costs of subsidizing housing loans to developers, the expert explains.
However, according to the Central Bank, the acquisition of housing by installments is an extremely risky tool, in particular, due to the opacity of the rules of sale, the lower occupancy of escrow accounts, as well as the hidden growth of the debt load of customers. And the regulator seeks to maintain controllability with all credit flows in order to guarantee the lack of financial imbalance. Conditionally, under all loans of banks, taking into account the quality of loan portfolios, “there are reserves formed in a certain volume, and there are no such regulatory guarantees in relation to the commercial loans,” said Ivan Rybakov, adviser to the Legal IEA. In this regard, it is likely that in the future measures will be taken that will limit the use of installments, says Banku.ru analyst Eryania Bochkin.
