How to buy a home without getting into debt!
How to buy a home and not get into debt!
Two years of continuous consultations, arguments, persuasion, correspondence with government agencies, organizing public hearings, and working with members of parliament... so much, so very much, of invisible work.
As always, in the beginning, no one believes you, no one understands, or no one simply wants to do anything.
Many trips to other countries to learn from their experience, to exchange knowledge, and to find the means to see with my own eyes how this actually works. There were sleepless nights, wondering if I was heading in the right direction, and prayers of gratitude to my family for understanding that I was diverting our family budget to search for experience and fulfill my mission, and if you will, my destiny.
Then came the search for like-minded people. The first to join were my family members, then came strong allies, also driven by the idea of serving society and giving people access to affordable housing. There were worries that these allies wouldn't be broken by the wall of incomprehension or distrust, or by the inertia of officials and people in important positions.
I am so proud of the intelligence and creative solutions of my like-minded partners in implementing this mission. With patience, hard work, and faith in our mission, and then more patience, more hard work, and more faith... We have come a long way!
It was all for a reason! We are now close to seeing justice prevail!
Finally, we are launching a pilot project for the construction of cooperative housing through consumer cooperation. I want to personally thank the current members of Parliament and the staff of the Committee for Construction and Housing and Utilities of the Ministry of Industry and Infrastructure Development of the Republic of Kazakhstan for your sincere desire to help our citizens acquire affordable housing. Your support gives us faith in President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev's "Zhana Kazakhstan" (New Kazakhstan).
We invite people with a big heart and a desire to help others and themselves acquire affordable housing to join our great cause! We will inscribe the names of those who helped build a specific home on a separate wall in each building. In this way, people who find affordable housing without the bondage of debt will have your names written into history on every home built through consumer cooperation.
Key Differences from Other Construction Models
The fundamental difference between construction based on consumer cooperation versus shared-equity construction and Housing and Construction Cooperatives (HCHCs) is:
Pilot Project Implementation
On July 3, 2023, we are sending an invitation to government agencies to participate in the implementation of this pilot project.
Goal of the Pilot Project: To develop a national methodology for building affordable housing for the population through consumer cooperation, with the aim of scaling it up across the Republic of Kazakhstan.
Timeline: July to December 2023.
To ensure transparency, oversight, and future scalability, we are forming an expert commission consisting of members of the Parliament of the Republic of Kazakhstan, government agencies, quasi-governmental organizations, media representatives, and civil activists.
We invite the following organizations to join the expert commission:
Goal of the Expert Commission:
A Call to Action
Friends! Join our mission!
If you have friends or relatives who need housing. Or if you are an employer and your employees need housing. Or if you or your friends have free land but lack the funds to start building homes. Or if you have friends who own construction companies that cannot complete their construction projects. Or if you have a design or engineering company ready to help cooperatives design and manage the home-building process for their members. Or if you are a construction company that is currently out of work and willing to build homes for people as a construction service provider, earning income from construction services, not as a speculator who inflates the price by 300% to 900% on every square meter of housing. If you are a company that sells construction materials and is ready to supply them to cooperatives across the country.
We ask you to inform all of them about the launch of this pilot project so they can join its implementation or at least monitor its progress. Later, once we have worked out all the kinks, they can participate in its scaling.
They can fill out the following Google Form: https://forms.gle/MbHS1JB9GgqCAUKJ9
You can do a good deed right now by forwarding this post to those who need affordable housing. Your like will help signal to the authorities that our country can and should make every Kazakhstani a homeowner. Do it right now.
If you want no poor person to be without a home in the vast Kazakh land, share this message with everyone.
Two years of continuous consultations, arguments, persuasion, correspondence with government agencies, organizing public hearings, and working with members of parliament... so much, so very much, of invisible work.
As always, in the beginning, no one believes you, no one understands, or no one simply wants to do anything.
Many trips to other countries to learn from their experience, to exchange knowledge, and to find the means to see with my own eyes how this actually works. There were sleepless nights, wondering if I was heading in the right direction, and prayers of gratitude to my family for understanding that I was diverting our family budget to search for experience and fulfill my mission, and if you will, my destiny.
Then came the search for like-minded people. The first to join were my family members, then came strong allies, also driven by the idea of serving society and giving people access to affordable housing. There were worries that these allies wouldn't be broken by the wall of incomprehension or distrust, or by the inertia of officials and people in important positions.
I am so proud of the intelligence and creative solutions of my like-minded partners in implementing this mission. With patience, hard work, and faith in our mission, and then more patience, more hard work, and more faith... We have come a long way!
It was all for a reason! We are now close to seeing justice prevail!
Finally, we are launching a pilot project for the construction of cooperative housing through consumer cooperation. I want to personally thank the current members of Parliament and the staff of the Committee for Construction and Housing and Utilities of the Ministry of Industry and Infrastructure Development of the Republic of Kazakhstan for your sincere desire to help our citizens acquire affordable housing. Your support gives us faith in President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev's "Zhana Kazakhstan" (New Kazakhstan).
We invite people with a big heart and a desire to help others and themselves acquire affordable housing to join our great cause! We will inscribe the names of those who helped build a specific home on a separate wall in each building. In this way, people who find affordable housing without the bondage of debt will have your names written into history on every home built through consumer cooperation.
Key Differences from Other Construction Models
The fundamental difference between construction based on consumer cooperation versus shared-equity construction and Housing and Construction Cooperatives (HCHCs) is:
- Legal Framework: Homes built through consumer cooperatives are regulated by a separate law of the Republic of Kazakhstan "On Consumer Cooperation" and by SNiPs (Construction Norms and Regulations). According to this law, a consumer cooperative is a legal entity that builds real estate for its employees or members.
- Cost Control: Unlike HCHCs and shared-equity construction, consumer cooperative members can control the construction cost and the use of the cooperative's funds, and they can approve procurement and materials. This ensures maximum quality and the lowest possible price for housing. Apartments that would normally cost 30 million tenge can be built for as little as 6 million tenge.
- Flexible Contributions: Consumer cooperative members, unlike those in HCHCs or shared-equity construction, can pay their share not only with money but also with land, equipment, labor, collateral, or services. This further reduces the cost of homes and makes them accessible even to those who don't have available cash but do have time, energy, and, most importantly, the desire to own a home.
- Corporate Membership: Not only individuals but also legal entities can be members of a consumer cooperative. This opens up opportunities to attract inexpensive funding to guarantee the completion of a project and provides a way for legal entities to grow their temporarily idle funds in profitable projects. This is significantly more profitable for legal entities than placing their funds in bank deposits.
- Non-Profit Advantage: A consumer cooperative is a non-profit organization. Unlike HCHCs or shared-equity projects, it can build more apartments than it has members. The surplus apartments can be sold at market price, and the profit can be used to offset construction costs. In an environment of constantly rising speculative real estate prices, this allows the cost of housing for cooperative members to be reduced to almost zero. If the cooperative's profit exceeds the construction cost, the surplus can be used to pay for the members' utility services, as decided by the general meeting.
- No Payment Defaults: Consumer cooperatives do not have payment defaults on apartment installments. According to the Law of the Republic of Kazakhstan "On Consumer Cooperation," if a cooperative member can no longer pay for some reason, their share is bought out by other members, the cooperative itself, or third parties. The cooperative member gets back all the contributions they have made. The person who buys out the share starts paying from the moment they receive the rights to it. Their benefit is that they acquire housing at its cost price and, if surplus apartments are sold, they can receive compensation for their participation in the construction on par with all other members.
- No Restrictions for Civil Servants: Our analysis shows that civil servants and public sector employees have no restrictions on being members of a consumer cooperative. Moreover, almost all civil servants are members of apartment owner cooperatives, dacha, or garage cooperatives, many of which are already structured as consumer cooperatives. The only restriction is that civil servants cannot be part of the cooperative's management bodies or receive a monetary income from its activities, but they do have the right to receive all the privileges of being a member.
Pilot Project Implementation
On July 3, 2023, we are sending an invitation to government agencies to participate in the implementation of this pilot project.
Goal of the Pilot Project: To develop a national methodology for building affordable housing for the population through consumer cooperation, with the aim of scaling it up across the Republic of Kazakhstan.
Timeline: July to December 2023.
To ensure transparency, oversight, and future scalability, we are forming an expert commission consisting of members of the Parliament of the Republic of Kazakhstan, government agencies, quasi-governmental organizations, media representatives, and civil activists.
We invite the following organizations to join the expert commission:
- National Association of Cooperatives and Other Forms of Economic Communities of the Republic of Kazakhstan
- Members of the Majilis of the Parliament of the Republic of Kazakhstan
- "Atameken" National Chamber of Entrepreneurs
- Committee for Construction and Housing and Utilities of the Ministry of Industry and Infrastructure Development of the Republic of Kazakhstan
- Ministry of National Economy of the Republic of Kazakhstan
- Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Kazakhstan
- Financial Monitoring Agency of the Republic of Kazakhstan
- Agency for Regulation and Development of the Financial Market of the Republic of Kazakhstan
- Kazakhstan Housing Company JSC
- "Otbasy Bank" JSC
- Akimat (City Hall) – to determine the region for the pilot.
Goal of the Expert Commission:
- To ensure full transparency and legality of the pilot.
- To pre-approve every step of the pilot and develop all mechanisms for protecting the rights and interests of cooperative members and developers.
- To formalize the positive experience and the correct methodology for building affordable housing through consumer cooperation.
A Call to Action
Friends! Join our mission!
If you have friends or relatives who need housing. Or if you are an employer and your employees need housing. Or if you or your friends have free land but lack the funds to start building homes. Or if you have friends who own construction companies that cannot complete their construction projects. Or if you have a design or engineering company ready to help cooperatives design and manage the home-building process for their members. Or if you are a construction company that is currently out of work and willing to build homes for people as a construction service provider, earning income from construction services, not as a speculator who inflates the price by 300% to 900% on every square meter of housing. If you are a company that sells construction materials and is ready to supply them to cooperatives across the country.
We ask you to inform all of them about the launch of this pilot project so they can join its implementation or at least monitor its progress. Later, once we have worked out all the kinks, they can participate in its scaling.
They can fill out the following Google Form: https://forms.gle/MbHS1JB9GgqCAUKJ9
You can do a good deed right now by forwarding this post to those who need affordable housing. Your like will help signal to the authorities that our country can and should make every Kazakhstani a homeowner. Do it right now.
If you want no poor person to be without a home in the vast Kazakh land, share this message with everyone.
The mission of the ALE SRO "National Association of Cooperatives and Other Forms of Economic Communities of the Republic of Kazakhstan" is to:
- Create the conditions for the development of cooperatives and other forms of economic communities as an effective mechanism for improving people's well-being through their self-organization, self-governance, cooperation, and mutual assistance.
- They also aim to develop and implement standards, rules, and procedures for interaction with government bodies and self-regulatory bodies. This will ensure the protection of the rights and property of cooperative members, the development of the cooperative movement, and the fight against financial pyramids.
© 2025 "National Association of Cooperatives and Other Forms of Economic Communities of the Republic of Kazakhstan"
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