Portfolio of loans to developers grows moderately in 2025 Q4 due to large-scale release of escrow accounts at year end
The project finance portfolio in housing construction was up by 2% over 2025 Q4 vs an 8% rise in 2025 Q3. Developers were actively repaying their loans using funds from escrow accounts for commissioned apartment buildings. Overall, the portfolio surged by 24% over 2025 to ₽10.2 trillion, fuelled by an increase in new construction projects, among other factors.
In 2025 Q4, inflows into escrow accounts were up by 46% (+58% YoY), totalling around ₽2 trillion. Growth in sales at the end of the year was associated with the tightening of the Family Mortgage programme terms starting February 2026, namely with the introduction of the ‘one subsidised loan per family’ rule. Total inflows into escrow accounts over 2025 hit a high of ₽5.5 trillion, exceeding the 2024 result by 11%.
That said, about ₽1.4 trillion (cumulative) have not been credited to escrow accounts yet. These mainly include payments for homes purchased under instalment plans in 2025. However, the portion of unpaid instalments relative to the total price of all shared construction agreements has been contracting for the second quarter in a row as developers prefer to receive payments in a lump sum to reduce project finance costs.
Debt coverage with the funds in escrow accounts remained broadly unchanged in 2025 Q4, amounting to adequate 69% (-3.4 pp over 2025). Considering the above, the weighted average interest rate on loans to developers (10.2%; +0.03 vs 2025 Q3 and +0.8 pp over 2025) is more than a third lower than in the segment of corporate loans (16.0%).
More details are available in the review Project Finance in Housing Construction in 2025 Q4.