RIA Novosti: Country house rental in the Moscow Region has become 30-40% cheaper this summer.

MOSCOW, March 31 - RIA Novosti, Yevgenia Petrova. The decrease in prices in the seasonal rental market for country real estate in the Moscow region has already reached 30-40% in certain segments compared to last year. At the same time, tenants have taken a wait and see position hoping that rental rates for summer cottages will decrease even more, experts told the RIA Real Estate website.

Debate over demand

Traditionally, lovers of country homes start renting in February. This year, requests started coming in at the beginning of the month, according to experts, but according to several companies, tenants have not been as active in signing rental agreements in early March as they were in previous years.

Demand for country homes in the "economy" segment fell by about 30% in February and March, according to the company "NDV Real Estate". As for premium rentals, demand has dropped by 20%, according to Yulia Grozheva, director of the country real estate department at Kalinka Group. Both experts attribute the reduced interest from tenants to the economic situation in the country.

"Metrium Group" notes that tenants of elite properties have taken a wait and see position in the hope that cottage rental rates will drop even further. "If landlords do not start reducing prices on time, the pessimistic forecast may come true," says Ilya Menzhunov, director of the elite real estate department of the company.

On the other hand, data from other market players indicate an increase in interest. According to "Miel Rent", demand in the "economy" segment increased by 38% this year compared to the same period last year. Analysts from Knight Frank report a 10-12% increase in demand in the luxury segment, attributing it to the fact that clients prefer to "wait out" the difficult economic situation by renting, as this method of owning property does not entail serious risks for them.

Either way, all experts predict that the peak of tenant interest in the rental market will be in April-May, when owners start offering discounts. According to them, the most sought-after areas traditionally remain the West, North-West, and South, as they have beautiful natural landscapes and are located near well-known recreation areas and bodies of water. Muscovites are less interested in renting cottages in the East and South-East of the region.

Rent instead of sale

Customers have become more selective in the face of a large volume of offerings, which has increased by 18% in the luxury country real estate segment compared to the same period last year, and by 20-25% in the "economy" and "comfort" segments, says Roman Zelensky, acting head of the rental department of the company "NDV Real Estate". The average time for properties to be rented has also increased. "If before, a property was typically on the market for a couple of days to a month, now we are seeing more and more offerings that are not being rented for several months," explains the expert.

"If we divide the offerings by segment, we can see that the largest number of houses are in the comfort class. Their share is 38%. The smallest number of offerings is in the economy segment, about 18%. Business-class cottages make up 20.5% of the total volume. A slightly larger volume is occupied by the elite segment - 23.5%," notes Zelensky.

The majority of "economy" rentals are cottages priced between 57 and 150 thousand rubles per month, located 10-29 kilometers from the Moscow Ring Road, which accounts for about 28%, says Maria Zhukova, first deputy director of the company "Miel Rent".

The number of luxury country rental offerings has increased by 15% this year compared to the same period last year. This is due to the fact that the majority of owners cannot sell their homes or do not want to do so for the prices offered by potential buyers, so rental income is an alternative for them.

This is related to a decrease in demand due to rising rental prices for expensive country houses. Most likely, this trend will continue until 2016, until the economic situation, particularly the exchange rate of the ruble, stabilizes, says Menzhunov from "Metrium Group".

Price collapse

Despite the fact that the market is heterogeneous and some owners of country houses are not in a rush to lower their rates, on average across the market in all segments, the decline was 30-40% compared to last year, Zelensky notes.

According to the database of "Miel-Arenda" objects, the cheapest property available for rent in the summer is a cottage for 30,000 rubles per month, located 22 kilometers from the Moscow Ring Road on the Dmitrovskoye highway. It is a house located in a non-commercial gardening community with an area of ​​100 acres in a dense coniferous forest near the Ikshinsky reservoir. The house has heating - AGV, water from a well, and a septic tank.

The minimum average cost is recorded in the southeast of the Moscow region. It is 74.8 thousand rubles, according to an expert from "Miel-Arenda". She notes that compared to the beginning of last season, that is, within 12 months, the average cost has decreased by 23%.

The cheapest house in the luxury rental segment can be rented in an old summer cottage village along the Kiev direction. Prices start from 120 thousand rubles, says Nadezhda Khazova, the CEO of the exclusive real estate agency "Usadba". According to "NDV-Nedvizhimost", the most expensive offer in the suburban real estate segment is still represented by cottages on Rublevo-Uspensky highway. A mansion with an area of ​​one thousand square meters on a plot of 50 acres is offered here for 4.5 million rubles per month.

The average price of luxury country houses this year is 400-500 thousand rubles per month, according to Solovyova from Knight Frank.

Moreover, rental prices for summer are in a wide range, there are both expensive and affordable houses in any direction.

If you predominantly choose the most expensive direction - Rublevo-Uspensky highway, you can rent a 150-square-meter house on a plot of 10 acres for 150 thousand rubles, while on Ostashkovsky and Dmitrovsky highways, for example, there are houses whose cost reaches a million rubles per month.

According to the expert from "Metrium Group", there are already many offers with a discount of up to 25% on the luxury country house rental market, and a more significant decrease in cost is expected by May.

May's passivity in the rental market always provokes discounts, so it will be possible to get a discount of 10-15% from property owners in the economy and business class who urgently need to rent out their property, but hardly more, considers Vadim Lamin, managing partner of the real estate agency Spencer Estate.  
Overall, Zelensky concludes, the suburban rental market is currently in favor of renters, as owners have to make concessions.