RBK Nedvizhimost: De Luxe Family Values
18 July 2013
RBK Nedvizhimost: De Luxe Family Values
Ten years ago affluent customers preferred spacious flats located in picturesque streets in the very centre of the city: Arbat, Prechistenka, Ostozhenka, etc. The location was the main criterion for expensive flats of that period. “At first everyone bought flats in the historical profitable mansions in the centre, communal apartments were vacated. Then modern houses began to be constructed, at that time the Golden Mile was constructed for prosperous families. At that time gigantism and multi-levelness were in fashion: flats with the floor spaces of 400-600 metres and more on two or three levels,” Denis Popov, Managing Partner of Contact Real Estate remembers stages of elite market development.
Requirements to floor space of flats have become more reasonable. Flats with inconvenient layouts fail to find their buyers. Architectural style of a building and modern project engineering became significant for buyers only about five years ago; along with the growth of competition in the market, requirements started to be specified.
“Construction and finishing materials, landscaped design as well as other peculiarities that earlier were not taken into account have taken on much more significance for buyers than, for example, the floor area of a flat. At the same time there was a tendency of shifting the elite supply outside the Garden Ring Road,” Karen Mlkonyan, Managing Partner of Elite Centre, remembers. A house without pronounced architectural style or an improperly designed one was not already interesting for a sophisticated buyer. Flats with inconvenient layouts, for example, 200 square metres with three windows remained non-demanded. Requirements for floor space have become more reasonable. If earlier a 200-metre-flat could be three-room, then day there should four rooms (at least three bedrooms),” Irina Mogilatova, General Director of TWEED real estate agency, gives examples.
At that time it became clear for affluent families that to live with children in concrete jungle without playgrounds for walking and in the polluted centre is hard. Many of them started actively to move to the countryside.
Back to the City
However, as the time has shown, fashion for living in a countryside house turned out to be short-lived. The main tendency of the last two years is return to the capital. “Over the last few years there has been observed some migration of families back to the city, the reason for which has become busy traffic. Owners of single family houses in the Moscow region need accommodations in the centre but with characteristics most closely resembling countryside. Moreover, for families where children have grown up, it has become inconvenient to torture a child with hours-long traffic jams on the way to school/college in the centre and back home,” Managing Partner of Contact Real Estate tells.
Experts unanimously note the key trend in elite urban development: construction of ecological houses with mixed formats of accommodations or “countryside in the city”. An absolute leader in this direction is the Khamovniki district. This is a natural extension of Ostozhenka and the most favourable for permanent family living district within the Third Ring Road. Apart from the fact that there is a large number of picturesque parks and preserved historical places - Neskuchny Garden , the Novodevichy Convent, Usadba Trubetskikh – in some development projects private rest areas intended only for residents of a residential complex are created. “In the district of Khamovniki we are building the elite residential quarter Knightsbridge Private Park, four club mansions with private infrastructure surrounded by the park with the area of two hectares. This project is an absolutely unique offer for Moscow: there are no so large-scale residential complexes of the same level in the centre of the city,” says Timur Sukharev, Chief Commercial Officer of Restavracia N.
The most comfortable will be such a house where there has been created soft atmosphere which soothes, not suppresses. Today buyers of real estate in high price segment consider first of all self-sufficient projects where notwithstanding the location in the centre of the city there have been created all conditions for comfortable and quiet life. “Moscow as any other metropolitan city is quite an aggressive space. That is why the most comfortable will be a house where there has been created soft atmosphere which soothes but does not suppress. Optimal conditions are created with the help of traditional architecture, soft colours in interior designs and facades,” says Leonid Krongauz, Partner and Co-founder of Kalinka Real Estate Consulting Group.
Another global tendency in the Moscow real estate market is green development. “Modern elite complex should be very technological to provide really comfortable conditions for living. For us the confirmation that we do everything in keeping with the newest western technologies is the BREEAМ certificate in accordance with standards of which Knightsbridge Private Park is being constructed”, Timur Sukharev concludes.
Future
If you are used to living in a private house in the countryside, then you treat spacious household and green trees behind windows as normal state of things and in the city you will look for a similar accommodation. Karen Melkonyan answers: “One of the latest tendencies in the urban elite real estate market are townhouses with small land plots where barbecue area, recreation area, sports ground, etc. can be placed. The residential complex Knightsbridge Private Park can be mentioned as an example of a project offering such accommodations.” So far such offers are very few in Moscow but some developers were the first to feel buyers’ moods and implemented an unusual for the market format in their projects: “Already at the stage of design of Knightsbridge Private Park we came to the decision that the first floors of mansions in the elite quarter will be occupied by two-storey-townhouses with private land plots where barbecue can be made or one can just rest in a lounge chair,” says Timur Sukharev, Chief Commercial Officer of Restavracia N.
According to the opinion of the majority of market participants, the format of a terraced two-storey townhouse is going to experience development in the top-range segment and in the coming years the demand for it especially among buyers with children will be growing. “We understood that our target audience are families with children and often with housekeeping staff. In the area of our complex there is a kindergarten and the largest private park in the Central Administrative Area,” says Timur Sukharev. “ If we consider urban real estate formats, a large family can live comfortably only in a spacious flat where there is an opportunity to organise a private area for each member of the family. And an urban townhouse is indeed a worth alternative to a countryside house but within a stone's throw from the centre of Moscow in a quiet privileged atmosphere of Khamovniki. De luxe segment means absolute comfort for life: when we offer to the market a project of the higher price category we realise that everything in it should be perfect.”
Source: РБК Nedvizhimost