Moscow And St.Petersburg Residential Markets In Last Years: The Comparative Analysis

Residential construction boom, based mainly on escalation in prices and high demand, touches most Russia cities on. In absolute values (constructed sq.m.) there are two leaders: Moscow and St. Petersburg. These capitals saved their soviet-time industrialized house-building that allowed to produce millions square meters of new houses per year. It is very interesting that the market processes (both for primary market and secondary one) were enough similar for these cities. But there exist some another differences (especially in the municipal building construction strategy), and this circumstance leads to interesting consequences for property markets. 2004 year became the year of trials for residential development companies, at that year Moscow and St. Petersburg (and many other Russian cities ) have been shake by first (after 2000 year) decrease in demand. But as compare to Moscow, St. Petersburg demonstrated significant fall in offer prices. What as the source of divergence? The answer is not simple. The paper represents results of comparative analysis of the residential property market situation in 2000-2005 years. The focus of the research is how residential construction and demographic situation influences on the market. We employ the extensive databases of the offer prices (primary and secondary markets) plus some other information about markets, housing supply etc. and found that building construction has now significant role for current housing markets (as compare to situation in 90th years). It seems that the divergence in 2004-2005 between Moscow and St. Petersburg became the result of the difference in municipal strategies in new house construction.