📋 Tender Overview
On March 1 2023 the provisions of the Act on housing cooperatives and the rules for the sale of real estate belonging to the municipal real estate resource in order to support the implementation of housing investments will come into force. They will facilitate the implementation of housing investments for groups of natural persons who would like to build a house on their own. Investment activities in this formula are also a greater chance for an apartment tailored to the needs of the family. The act has just been published in the Journal of Laws.Regulating the functioning of housing cooperatives is the main objective of the new act. The regulation also introduces preferences in the sale of municipal real estate for the needs of grassroots housing construction. Housing cooperatives and newly established housing cooperatives that implement investments to meet the housing needs of their own members or their children can count on them.Housing cooperativesA housing cooperative is a group of natural persons e.g. relatives friends or acquaintances who want to buy a plot of land together and build single-family houses or a multi-family building with apartments on it in which they will then live themselves. In the cooperative formula it is also possible to purchase and renovate an existing building in order to create apartments tailored to the individual needs of the group. The act also allows the members of the cooperative to carry out investments in order to provide housing for children.The stakeholders themselves pointed out the need to introduce the housing cooperative formula into the legal order. This may contribute not only to increasing interest in housing investments carried out by groups of future residents. It can also strengthen the position of people cooperating with each other in order to obtain flats on their own in relations with entities influencing the investment and construction process e.g. communal governments and financial institutions.Involvement of municipalities in bottom-up housing initiativesHowever the Act defines not only the framework for cooperation of members of housing cooperatives. Moreover it introduces another tool that complements the instruments of municipal housing policy. Thanks to these solutions communes will be able to become more involved in activities supporting bottom-up housing construction. This may contribute to a wider satisfaction of the housing needs of members of the self-government community.For this purpose the Act provides for specific rules for the sale of real estate belonging to the communal real estate stock intended for bottom-up housing construction. Such solutions include the form of the tender i.e. the tender limited to cooperatives and cooperatives alternative forms of settlement and the possibility of granting the purchaser a discount on the real estate price by the commune.Municipalities granting discounts on the prices of real estate sold by them for the purposes of grassroots housing construction will be able to apply for a grant for infrastructure i.e. non-repayable support from the state budget for projects serving the development of technical or social infrastructure in the municipality.Benefits for individualsAmong the benefits of using the new formula of investment cooperation it is worth mentioning the possibility of meeting ones own housing needs outside the development market. Running an investment on your own gives you a chance to save up to approx. 20 in the costs of obtaining a flat. An investment implemented in this way also allows members of a housing cooperative to adjust the conditions of future residence and thus its quality to individual needs and preferences. Thanks to the new solutions members of the cooperative will also have a stronger position in relations with local governments e.g. in order to obtain organizational assistance or purchase real estate for development and financial institutions e.g. in order to obtain funds for construction.Benefits for municipalitiesImplementation of investments in the formula of a housing cooperative in the commune is associated with many benefits for the local community. It gives the possibility of effective management of commune space including preventing suburbanization and depopulation and using this formula in revitalization processes. It also creates conditions for increasing the housing stock for the implementation of the communes own tasks without the need to engage additional financial resources for housing investments thanks to the possibility of purchasing or renting premises and buildings created in the cooperative formula. The benefits of strong local social ties and the right to apply for a grant for infrastructure if the municipality allows discounts on the price of real estate are also significant.Family housing loan Flat without own contributionDue to the change in the conditions regarding the mortgage loan market and in relation to the governments protective measures supporting households in improving housing conditions the Act amended part of the provisions of the Act of October 1 2021 on guaranteed housing loans Journal of Laws of 2022 item 2008. The amendment to the regulations mainly concernsthe abolition of the provision on the minimum amount of the guarantee which allows for a higher own contribution - from 10 to 20enabling family repayments to be used by people who have accumulated funds to cover 20 of the property value and increasing this parameter to even 30 in the case of borrowers who take loans with a fixed or periodically fixed interest rateincreasing the own contribution limit - from PLN 100000 PLN up to PLN 200 thousand zlotyenabling the purchase of a flat or a single-family house from the resources of a housing cooperative to be financed from the loanincreasing by 0.1 the value of the coefficients determining the price limits per m 2 of usable floor space
