Photo: PexelsThe purchase of holiday homes in the last few years, i.e. since the beginning of the corona virus pandemic, has increased significantly, so citizens often turned to banks for a loan for this type of real estate. However, you cannot buy a holiday home on credit if it is registered as a holiday home, holiday home or apartment.
Namely, a housing loan is a specific loan that is exclusively approved for the purchase of a residential unit (an object that is registered as an apartment or house), i.e. for solving the housing issue.
"Even if you secure another property that is registered as a housing unit for a mortgage, the bank should reject you for the realization of such a loan." "The purchase of a summer house can be realized with the help of a cash loan, which is approved for a maximum of 71 months, with slightly higher interest rates than with housing loans," says Snežana Vukmirović, credit advisor of the City Expert agency, in an interview with Biznis.rs.
Cash loans are non-purposed, which means that clients do not prove to the bank what the funds are being spent on, so there is no exact data on what percentage of this type of real estate is purchased with the help of loans.
"The buyer of a smaller building located in a weekend settlement registered as a holiday home will certainly appear as a cash buyer in the sales contract," points out Vukmirović.
She states that the apartments located on Zlatibor, Kopaonik or in the spas are mostly registered as apartments in multi-family residential buildings and as such they can be subject to purchase and mortgage, and it is also possible to approve a housing loan.
But, depending on the location and the cadastral municipality where the real estate is located, the bank may request a participation that is higher than 20 percent.
"Until March of this year, we had a good period, where the Euribor value was in the red and loans of any kind were cheaper compared to previous years." The situations that befell us, such as the corona virus pandemic and the energy crisis, made money more expensive and led to an increase in reference interest rates. They are an integral part of nominal interest and lead to its increase", says Vukmirović.
Current interest rates in banks are at the level of 2010 - around 5.2 percent variable, or 6.95 percent fixed, with only a few banks offering the possibility for clients to borrow at fixed interest rates.
As Ismail Musabegović, professor of the Belgrade Banking Academy (BBA), recently told Biznis.rs, banks are not allowed to give loans, especially not long-term ones, with fixed interest rates.
"For example, if the reference interest rate is now four percent, it will be five to six percent for loans, and the fixed rate would have to be eight, nine or ten for that type of loan." It is unattractive for those who want a loan. "Only in the case that they think that this situation will continue for a long period, and that is why they decide on such a high fixed interest rate," said Musabegović.
Credit counselor Snežana Vukmirović estimates that the impact of the increase in interest rates on the demand for housing loans is already being felt.
"The interest rate increase influenced the decision of a number of citizens to give up buying an apartment right now, but there are still a significant number of credit requests in the banks." It is often more profitable for clients to pay loan installments than rent, so a client who buys real estate for housing will certainly not give up the purchase easily. "The problem may arise during the analysis and approval of requests, because banks have slightly tightened the criteria compared to previous years and are more rigorous when selecting clients to lend," she concludes.
Source: biznis.rs
