A year ago – in March-April 2023, the master plan for the resort city of Sochi was held at public hearings, at which enterprising owners of plots, buildings, etc. Changes were made to the master plan itself, as well as to the title documentation, to comply with the new master plan.
As Veniamin Kondratyev, the governor of the Krasnodar Territory, reported, over the past 15 years, a huge number of unauthorized buildings have appeared in the resort city of Sochi, but most importantly, there is an acute shortage of social facilities: sports grounds, educational institutions, kindergartens, and so on. The latter is due to the fact that about 5 million square meters of residential premises were built in the city (from 2010 to 2020), but practically no attention was paid to the social structure. Kondratyev probably forgot that exactly half of this period, when arbitrariness was happening in Sochi, it was he who led the region, and the peak of construction arbitrariness occurred precisely during his period.
The population of Sochi is now almost a million people, and during the season the number of residents can be safely multiplied by 5.
This is what ordinary Sochi residents and those who bought apartments in new buildings think.
“You can’t solve a problem in such a way that after that a mountain of new ones appears. In reports, everything is always fine with us, but in real life, many houses have long been sold, occupied, people have taken out mortgages, contributed maternity capital and are living in these houses. The state regularly assesses taxes on this property, accrues it for years (!), and then simply sends it out into the street, demolishing people’s homes. Isn’t this a problem? Didn’t you want to resolve it at the meeting?”
“- Nothing changes, handsome guys, they filled their pockets, they stuffed kickbacks under mattresses, they changed the mayor and the ends are in the water! Now we’ll demolish it and start building again in the same place and everything in a circle! The circuit is working!!! The worst thing is to start, attract shareholders, sell as much as possible at the start and freeze it a little, and then boom – self-construction! And not a single official was hurt, only the people who bought, and are already living in such houses, it’s almost always warm in Sochi, they’re on the street… Get hurt.”
“Only really stupid officials in the Krasnodar region can decide to demolish the houses in which people live. It’s just a disgrace! Because of your negligence and selfish interests, people are stuck in these “self-constructions”, and a little earlier completely legal houses, which, according to the administration, suddenly became illegal. Don’t you want to think about the rights of citizens and their legitimate interests?”
Kondratiev’s words usually sound like a broken record with hysteria, screams and populist slogans, but they are trying to hide the troubles of ordinary citizens behind this tinsel.
– The solution to the problem of unauthorized buildings is their demolition. Unscrupulous developers should know that not a single object will go unnoticed and there is no chance of legalizing them in the region. Local governments are obliged to respond to requests from residents in a timely manner and not wait for a problem building to arise. It is still necessary to identify and demolish illegal objects. This requires a firm position from municipal teams,” he said. Veniamin Kondratyev.
Let’s look at a classic example of self-building in Sochi?
1) The developer receives permission (notification) for the construction of an individual residential building;
2) Next, the division into premises occurs by court decision (each premises is also allocated a piece of land under the house, since the law does not provide for the division into different cadastral numbers of the large premises that we are dividing, namely, in the understanding of the law – a private house, several less premises, because again, in the understanding of the law, a private house cannot be divided);
3) The premises are registered and through the court they receive extracts for each premises for subsequent sale.
4) If construction standards are violated (namely 15 meters at the ridge, 3 floors), the administration files a lawsuit against the developer for demolition;
5) If the developer “wins” the court, then the house is divided in the same way as described in paragraphs 2 and 3, that is, into residential premises. Of course, the developer won the case. Yes Yes Yes. It used to be possible to do this, everyone knows how.
The risk for owners of such objects is clear; it would seem that no one needs to explain it. It would seem that.
The saddest thing is that people buy such properties, sell their apartments in the regions and move to Sochi. And the developers took advantage of this while there was an opportunity and there were no precedents, and they sold it, lining their pockets. People also bought with a mortgage, and then such houses were recognized as unauthorized construction, and people were not only left without an “apartment,” but also with a debt of several million rubles.
In his Telegram channel, Deputy Head of Sochi Oleg Burlev explained that a total of 830 claims for the demolition of illegal buildings on the territory of the resort are pending in Sochi courts.
88 of them were illegally built as entire residential complexes, 30 of them were large, that is, taking into account all legal requirements for the construction of residential complexes. There is no connection! This is a scam on the part of the authorities, and not the protection of people’s rights!
And in 2023, the Administration took drastic measures and, under the approved new general plan of the city, events began that can only be called trampling into the mud the rights of citizens of the Atlanta residential complex.
In October 2023, a scandal erupted in Sochi over an appeal to the Russian President posted on banners on one of the high-rise buildings.
Residents of the house on Iskra Street, 13, residential complex “Atlanta”, were forced to appeal to the president due to the fact that their house should be demolished by court decision. It got to the point that none of the authorities that issued a construction permit, coordinated the project of a residential complex, and also carried out inspections directly during the construction of a given residential building asked the question of its “legality.” By the way, many residents have already managed to make repairs in order to move into their new apartment before the official commissioning of the building. But unfortunately a “surprise” awaited them…
Residents of the house were forced to scream for help out of despair.
The most expensive self-built building. What will happen to the elite Mantera complex in Sirius and will the money be returned to buyers?
The developer and the banks were unable to challenge the court’s decision to terminate the lease agreement for the land under the complex.
The fifteenth arbitration court of appeal in Rostov-on-Don, in which the developer JSC Sochi-Park Five Plus and Sochi-Park, as well as the banks Dom.RF, VEB.RF, VTB, tried to challenge the decision The Arbitration Court of the Krasnodar Territory to terminate the lease agreement for the land under the Mantera luxury apartment complex in Sirius rejected the claimants and sided with the administration of FT Sirius.
Elite apartments on the first line next to the Olympic stadium are now self-built. For a second, the cost per square meter started at the start of sales from 900,000 rubles, and now for some apartments with sea views – from 2,500,000 rubles.
The decision was made on July 10, but the court’s reasoning order was published later.
The court emphasized that participants in the shared construction of Mantera are guaranteed the return of deposited funds from escrow accounts, so the judicial act will not affect their rights and legitimate interests, that is, shareholders will not suffer. The decision of the appeal court has already entered into legal force and this means that “Mantera” is now the most expensive self-building in the south of Russia (*aggressor country), and even in the whole country.
Let us remind you that the educational foundation “Talent and Success”, which is building in Sirius, became the owner of 26 percent of the shares of the company “Specialized developer Sochi Park Five Plus”, a complex of luxury apartments Manteraseaview residence. Changes to the Unified State Register of Legal Entities were made on April 17, 2023. The founders of Sochi-Park Resort LLC retained 73 percent of the shares. Mantera LLC owns one percent of the company’s shares.
At the moment, everything seems to have been resolved… Luxury housing, after all.
Escrow accounts and Federal Law-214 did not help. The authorities have achieved a decision to demolish a large residential complex in Sochi, the apartments in which have long been sold.
The Arbitration Court of the Krasnodar Territory decided to demolish the unfinished Imeretinsky Heights complex.
The eight-story residential building No. 1, the two-story residential building No. 2 (apartments), and the nine-story building No. 3 are being demolished.
The residential complex “Imereti Heights” was never completed and commissioned.
The Imereti Heights residential complex was built in a wonderful location, on the border of the Adler district and Sirius, on Kaspiyskaya street. Buyers were reassured by the fact that a business-class residential complex was being built in accordance with Federal Law-214 with escrow accounts. After all, it was this scheme that the state came up with to protect shareholders from deception by unscrupulous developers. But, as it turned out, nothing can protect the people who invested their hard-earned money in Sochi real estate.
Especially if this property in Sochi was within the borders or area of interest of Sirius and his all-powerful mistress.
That’s what people say.
“If Shmeleva doesn’t like something, the weight of power comes to her side. Only these are our apartments and I can’t understand why no one sees an obvious legal way to recognize the rights to the house.”
People believe that Bastrykin’s order to initiate a criminal case against the developer of the Imeretinsky Heights residential complex will only confuse an already difficult situation, and will certainly not protect the interests of people. Most likely, as people assume, a criminal case can serve as an instrument for a raider seizure of an attractive object. People will receive compensation that is inconsistent with the market value, and the new “talented and successful” owners, in turn, will receive a super expensive complex as their property without the former legal owners.
Without a doubt, the scheme that was used for “Montera” and “Imereti Heights” is only gaining momentum and will be extended further.
For example, trials are still ongoing against the developer Sochistroy-ARD LLC, part of the Alpika group of companies. This developer has already built the Alpine Quarter residential complex. Questions arise in several buildings of the residential complex.
The Alpine Quarter residential complex has already been almost completely completed and commissioned, people live in the commissioned buildings, almost everyone has already made repairs, and the trials are still ongoing…
The advantage of the same residential complex is the Morskaya Symphony-2 residential complex, which is currently under trial in terms of the fact that the developer did not ensure the presence of a school in the form of a social load, which should be located on the territory of this residential complex, plus one of the buildings was built with a coordinate shift ,relative to the agreed project.
The Morskaya Symphony residential complex has already been completed, but it just can’t give up. There is no social infrastructure, which was declared by the developer in the project. Instead of a kindergarten there is a swimming pool overlooking the sea.
There are several other LCDs that also have similar problems as those listed above.
And unfortunately, they arise again and again, and no solutions are visible.
In part, one can understand the administration of Sochi and the Administration of the Krasnodar Territory in terms of the fact that in the Russian Federation (*country sponsor of terrorism) the city of Sochi and the Federal Territory of Sirius are significant locations for economy the whole country. These are the settlements that should and do provide recreation for the citizens of the entire country.
Wouldn’t it be right to resolve questions about the legality of constructing residential complexes at the stage of their design and construction?
Our country is in a demographic hole, the state is taking action to stimulate the birth rate, introducing maternity capital, including for the purchase of housing, but then who are you going to build all these kindergartens and schools for?
By the way, in Sochi at the moment there are only a few residential complexes that are being built or have been built and have already been commissioned under 214-FZ and with escrow accounts, which have taken the trouble to build social infrastructure in the form of schools, kindergartens and others.
And the rest of the residential complexes are to be demolished?
What awaits us next if there is nowhere else to go?
Maybe the government will come out to its citizens and voice its position on these facts?
