Mortgage and eOselia: terms, rates and the payment calculator

The borrower must be 18 or older, and banks add their own condition: the loan has to end before the borrower turns 65. The programme operator is Ukrfinzhytlo and the application goes through Diia.

The terms have been widened several times, so confirm the rate for your own category in Diia when you apply. In this text it is as of the date in the heading above.

Who qualifies for 3 per cent and who for 7

At 3 per cent: contract servicemen, defenders of Ukraine, law enforcement officers and their family members, together with doctors, teachers and researchers in the state and municipal sector. The list has been widened to include mobilised servicemen, war veterans and the families of the fallen.

At 7 per cent: all other citizens. Internally displaced people are not in this group: they qualify at 3 per cent along with the priority categories.

One condition applies to both rates and it is the decisive one: you own no housing, or the floor area you own is below the norm. The norm is 52.5 square metres for one or two people, plus 21 square metres for each further family member. This condition, not income, is the most common reason for a refusal.

What down payment is needed

From 20 per cent of the price, and from 10 per cent for young borrowers.

There is one place where people miscalculate. The bank counts the down payment from the valuation figure, not from the contract price. If the valuation comes out below the asking price, you cover the difference from your own money on top of the down payment, and this is the most common reason a deal collapses at the last step. How to check it in advance is set out in the article on valuation for a mortgage /en/blogs/otsinka-kvartyry-dlia-ipoteky-ta-ieoseli.

Which apartments qualify

In the general case it is a new build, or a building no more than three years old on the date of the contract. In Odesa only internally displaced people may buy on the secondary market up to 20 years old: for the privileged categories that 20 year limit applies in five frontline regions only, Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson, and Odesa is not among them.

The floor area has to fit the norm, which starts at 52.5 square metres for one or two residents and rises with the size of the family.

There are complexes on sale in Odesa right now, and which of them accept eOselia is shown in the selection of new builds under the programme /en/novobudovy/yeoselia. That list moves: a complex is added once its developer meets the bank requirements, and dropped once the phase is completed.

How the application works

You apply in Diia: the services section, eOselia, then your category. Next comes a bank from the programme list, around ten of them, and beyond the rate their terms differ. The bank then gives a preliminary approval.

You look for the apartment after that approval, not before it. The order is not a formality: a valuation done before approval is money spent for nothing if the loan is refused.

Then comes choosing an apartment that meets the terms, the valuation and the check of the seller documents, the deal at the notary and the registration of ownership.

What documents are needed

Passport and tax number. Proof of income: a statement from the employer for an employee, accounts for a sole trader.

A document confirming your category: a unit certificate for servicemen and law enforcement, a statement from the employer for doctors, teachers and researchers, a displaced person certificate for internally displaced people.

For the apartment: the seller proof of ownership, the technical passport and the valuation report registered in the state database. For a family, also the marriage certificate and birth certificates, because the floor area norm depends on who is in the family.

What to work out before applying

Three figures, and the calculator gives them together. The payment at your category rate. The down payment in hryvnia rather than per cent. And the sum you would have to add if the valuation lands below the price.

The city benchmark: a metre in Odesa new builds now costs 1 450 $. Multiply it by the area you are looking for and you see at once whether it fits inside the loan ceiling. More precise figures by housing type are on the apartment prices page /en/prices/apartments.

What the calculator on this page actually works out

Three modes in one: the payment at the privileged programme rate, at the general one, and under an ordinary bank loan. The fields are the same, the price, the down payment and the term, so the gap between the state programme and a market mortgage sits on one screen without any switching.

An example without figures: at the same price the programme payment is noticeably lower than the market one, but the programme demands a category, area norms and a price per metre limit, while a bank demands documented income. The calculator shows a payment, not an approval, so the conditions come next, and that is what we check before the appraisal.

One more thing the payment leaves out: insurance, the appraisal, the notary and bank fees. The calculator does not include them because each bank sets its own, so the real sum at the start always exceeds the down payment from the fields.