Emergency and dilapidated housing: how to achieve resettlement

Recommendation points

• Emergency housing
• Dilapidated housing
• The main signs of the unsuitability of a building for housing
• What needs to be done for housing to be recognized as emergency

According to the latest official data in Russia, about 16 million square meters. m. of living space are recognized as emergency, of which 10 million are housing in apartment buildings. And these are only official figures, but how many more dilapidated houses, officials are silent.

Margarita Shigina. Old house. 2009

Unfortunately, not everyone living in old and decaying houses knows that Russia has a federal targeted program for relocating residents from old houses to new housing at the expense of budget funds. Only, in order to participate in this program, it is necessary that the housing received the status of unfit for habitation. Let’s try to figure out who has the right to new apartments, and which housing should be recognized as unfit for living in accordance with current legislation..

Emergency housing

What is meant by the term emergency housing? In Russia, the criteria for housing unsuitable for living are established in the Government decree of January 28, 2006. No. 47. As follows from its content, the basis for the resettlement of citizens is the emergency state of a residential facility, which poses a certain danger to living, or a threat to human health. This definition includes emergency houses subject to demolition..

Paragraph 34 of this decree states that residential premises that are located in prefabricated, stone and brick houses, as well as in wooden houses and houses built from local materials that have serious deformations of load-bearing structures, foundations, are recognized as emergency, unsuitable for habitation and subject to demolition, walls, as well as a significant percentage of biological damage to wooden structures, which indicates the exhaustion of their bearing capacity and potential danger to people due to the collapse of the building.

Only special regional / city interdepartmental commissions can officially recognize or not recognize a house as emergency. At the same time, the main criterion influencing the final conclusion is not the general percentage of wear of the load-bearing structures of the object, but the state of the load-bearing walls, foundation, main floors threatening to collapse..

According to the law, emergency housing is subject to mandatory resettlement, but the authorities may not rush to resettle dilapidated housing.

Remember that the local government must declare unsuitable for living not only municipal housing, but also residential premises owned by residents, if they are in disrepair.

It should be noted that the commission, after inspecting the object, can recognize only individual apartments in the house as emergency, and simply refer the rest to the category of “dilapidated housing”. The fact is that, according to the law, emergency housing is subject to mandatory resettlement, but the authorities may not be in a hurry to resettle dilapidated housing..

Dilapidated housing

The main difference between dilapidated and dilapidated houses is the relative safety of living, since the latter do not threaten residents to collapse at any second. Nevertheless, dilapidated housing also has non-replaceable structures that are out of order, and the general wear and tear of such buildings is most often close to or exceeds 70%.

Aristarkh Vasilievich Lentulov. The sun is over the rooftops. Sunset. 1928

As a rule, it is the owners and tenants of dilapidated housing that experience the greatest problems, since the state does not resettle them, unlike dilapidated houses, since it is relatively safe to live in dilapidated housing, at least for some time, and the authorities do not recognize the house as an emergency hurry.

At the same time, another problem immediately arises, in many regions there are regulations that establish that major repairs in houses with wear of more than 70% at the expense of budget funds are not provided.

So it turns out that the residents of dilapidated houses are in a “suspended state.” On the one hand, the authorities admit that the conditions are not appropriate. But on the other hand, since as long as the objects do not pose an immediate threat to people’s lives, no one will resettle or repair such houses..

The main signs of the unsuitability of a building for housing

Let’s nevertheless note the main signs that allow us to recognize the premises as unfit for habitation:

1. The premises have seriously exceeded the main indicators of sanitary and epidemiological safety for several physical and sanitary and epidemiological factors;
2. The building is located in potentially dangerous zones of avalanches, mudflows, landslides, in zones of man-made disasters, and also in territories annually flooded with flood waters;
3. The house is located in close proximity to the power line;
4. A room located in an apartment building that has received serious damage as a result of fires, explosions, accidents, earthquakes, subsidence of soil and other geological phenomena;
5. If the windows of the apartment overlook the highways, when the noise level exceeds the maximum permissible standards;
6. Rooms above or adjacent to which there is a device for flushing and cleaning the garbage chute.

We also note that the premises must be declared unsuitable if it is impossible to reduce the influence of the detected harmful factors on the health of residents by engineering and design methods..

In turn, it does not serve as a basis for recognizing the premises as unfit for habitation:

• the absence of a garbage chute and an elevator in a house above 5 floors, if due to physical wear and tear it is in a limited working condition, and at the same time it is not subject to major repairs and reconstruction;
• lack of centralized hot water supply and sewerage in a 1- and 2-storey building.

What needs to be done for housing to be recognized as emergency

First of all, you need to get an opinion from a specialized organization on the condition of the house. If you live in Moscow, you must submit to the prefecture of the district in which your house is located, an application for declaring the object unfit for living. Attach to your application:

• copies of documents of title to the apartment, necessarily certified by a notary;
• floor plan,
• technical passport of the apartment,
• you can also attach statements or written complaints from your and / or neighbors regarding inappropriate living conditions.

Officials must create a special commission within 30 days to inspect all apartments and the technical condition of the house. This commission must include representatives of the fire inspection, sanitary and epidemiological service and other authorities. The commission must conduct a comprehensive assessment of the technical compliance of the residential premises with the requirements established in Resolution No. 47. After that, experts recognize the dwelling as suitable or unsuitable for living. Also, the commission makes a decision on the recognition (or not recognition) of the assessed apartment building as emergency and subject to demolition or reconstruction.

Based on the results of the research, the commission must issue a verdict: is there a real threat to your safety, life and health. The final decision (act) must be handed over to the tenants within five days from the date of its preparation.

Apollinary Mikhailovich Vasnetsov. Ruins of a house. 1900

If the commission recognized the house as dilapidated and subject to demolition, then the lease and lease agreements for the residential premises in it must be terminated. Note that contracts for unsuitable for habitation premises can be terminated in court at the request of either party.

It should also be remembered that residents can appeal against the decision not to recognize the house as emergency executive bodies of the constituent entity of the Russian Federation or local self-government bodies in court if they do not agree with it..

If you have an act on the recognition of your house as unfit for habitation, and local officials still continue to drag out relocation to new housing, without wasting time, you need to go to court. In a lawsuit, you need to demand from the court to oblige the executive authority (in Moscow it is the Department of Housing Policy and Housing Fund) to provide you with new comfortable housing instead of emergency housing.

In conclusion, I would like to note that the situation with emergency and dilapidated housing in our country will probably change soon. The regions, of course, for various reasons, including the limited financial resources, are lagging behind in resolving this problem. However, in the capital at the beginning of August 2011, a regional targeted program “On the relocation of citizens from emergency housing for 2011-2012” was approved, for the implementation of which over 630 million rubles were allocated. Officials plan to relocate 467 properties, which are home to 1,316,000 people.

If you think that your home also meets all the signs of an accident and is not suitable for living, then you should defend your rights. If the officials do not meet you halfway, it is necessary to conduct an independent examination of the technical condition of the house and apply to the court with this document.