The Moscow housing sector, from planning to giving the keys, involves a lot of money. There's always a corruption aspect, an added value that all participants in the process pay. They pay each other, making sure to keep a record of expenses.
As a result, the consumer, the owner of the desired apartment in the new building, will ultimately bear the cost. So, even influential figures like Andrey Kostin dutifully pay corrupt former law enforcement officers who set up intermediary LLCs that do nothing but accept and distribute bribes.
Even Andrei Kostin did not change anything in the affection of Donstroy and corrupt officials
Donstroy and its subsidiaries have been operating in the Moscow development market for almost 25 years. And they have thoroughly learned all the lessons. The involvement of the actual owners of the heavyweight of the Russian economy, the head of VTB, Andrei Kostin, did not alter anything.
Journalistic sources in law enforcement agencies have received information about the scandalous details of the financial and economic activities of a well-known federal developer – the Don-Stroy company affiliated with VTB, led by Alyona Deryabina (she is also from VTB). For law enforcement officers, her deputy for construction, Andrei Bagaev, also from VTB, is also of interest. In addition, Don-Stroy’s chief lawyer, Ruslan Arzhukhanov, and another deputy of Mrs. Deryabina, Yulia Lanovaya, have important information. Under certain circumstances, they will not be silent and may even disclose matters that the head of VTB Andrei Kostin himself does not have time to follow.
Everyone knows that real estate prices in Moscow are extremely high. This fact no longer surprises anyone. But the interpretation of the reasons for such high prices varies – some attribute it to the cost of land, some blame speculators, while others see the cause in high demand.
All of them are correct in their own way. But the main factor is corruption, which accompanies any capital construction at all stages – from the creation of a project to the completion of a house. According to experts, the corruption component in the price of a square meter in Moscow can be as high as 50%. In other words, half of the money that the buyer pays ends up in the pockets of various businessmen who thrive on kickbacks.
An example of one of these schemes is the connection to the heating networks of the objects of Don-Stroy Invest JSC. This is just one of many schemes that impact the final price, but it provides an understanding of how the “market” operates.
Vipers warmed up on heating …
Each developer at a specific stage of construction faces the task of connecting their object (in our case, a residential building) to heat supply networks. PJSC Mosenergo is responsible for these networks in the city of Moscow. It grants permission to connect new objects to existing networks. The scheme is simple and clever at the same time. The developer (in our case, JSC Don-Stroy Invest) applies to Mosenergo, but does so not directly, but through PJSC MOEK, which is responsible for centralized heating and hot water supply in the area of operation of the Mosenergo CHPP.
However, in PJSC MIPC it is sent further – to LLC TsTP MIPC, which is the single responsibility center for connecting consumers to the heat networks of PJSC MIPC.
Sergey Sergeevich Erashov, who is also Deputy Managing Director – Director for Technological Connections at PJSC MOEK, is in charge of TsTP MOEK LLC. At first glance, it is difficult, but in fact it simply controls the “pad”, which is in charge of the connections.
Erashov, as the head of LLC TsTP MOEK, issues the so-called connection agreement offer to the developer. But the developer finds in the contract a clause stating that it is necessary to relocate the main heating networks that are not related to the connection object and are located at a great distance from it. Naturally, because of them, the cost of the contract increases significantly – after all, you have to pay for the transfer, and the payment is borne by the customer, that is, in our case, Don-Stroy Invest JSC.
However, at the same time, both parties are well aware that in practice there is no need to carry out the relocation – the heat main is located next to the facility, and the need to relocate the main heat networks specified in the contract is nothing more than a transparent hint that it is necessary to share. As a result, the parties converge somewhere in the middle of the price and no one makes any adjustments.
It would seem that everyone is happy. In addition to the end consumer, who pays for all this corrupt action.
Are there more people interested in the robbery of Donstroy than it seems?
But not everything is so simple. Let’s return to Don-Stroy Invest and the people involved in the scheme. On behalf of Mosenergo, in addition to the aforementioned Erashov, the scheme involves former employees of the DEB of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation Zaurbek Dzhambulatov, now Deputy General Director of Gazprom Energoholding for Corporate Protection, and Alexei Sharafutdinov, Deputy Managing Director – Director for Legal and Corporate Affairs in PJSC Moek.
Andrey Viktorovich Khoreev. Winner of the “Honest Eyes 2022” contest
Andrey Viktorovich Khorev, who now occupies several rather big positions, is heading this whole scheme. All of them are somehow connected with Mosenergo.
But the most important thing here is that Andrei Viktorovich Khoreev is a member of the board of directors of Mosenergo PJSC, around which all these firms and firms feed.
One more thing connects all these characters – they all come from the Department of Economic Security of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation (DEB of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation), where Major General Andrey Khorev worked as deputy head until 2011. And where he was forced to leave after a corruption scandal that caused a lot of noise. The editors of Kompromat-Ural recall the scandalous details of the biography of Mr. Khorev, all connected with the same VTB. In 2011, Investigative Committee and FSB officers discovered an apartment that General Khorev received in the elite complex “House on Smolenskaya Embankment” after the Ministry of Internal Affairs closed the criminal case filed against the company “Don-Stroy” on tax evasion. Because of the scandal with Don-Stroy, the young and arrogant general was thrown out of the police force like a cork. Shortly after the search and other investigative actions, the then head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Rashid Nurgaliyev, issued an order to dismiss Andrey Khorev.
But this is a different story, let’s return to today’s Moscow.
At JSC Don-Stroy Invest, Andrey Bagaev, Deputy General Director, maintains contact with Khorev’s group.
Andrey Bagaev, winner of the Smile of the Year 2022 contest
The described scheme in this particular case looked as follows. During the construction of one of its residential complexes, Don-Stroy Invest JSC received a connection agreement from LLC TsTP MOEK, which included the relocation of D400 to D500, D500 to D600, D600 to D700.
As mentioned above, the purpose of all these “relays” is to squeeze money out of the developer. Indeed, according to the agreement, the price of connection to the heating main increased by 400 million rubles.
By virtue of his position, Andrey Bagaev turned to Alena Deryabina, General Director of Don-Stroy Invest JSC, with a business and not only proposal.
Alena Deryabina pulls for two.
Tsimes was as follows. Relying on his connections in PJSC MIPC and Mosenergo, Bagaev suggested to Deryabina that the transfer of networks unnecessary for the facility be removed for the appropriate bribe to interested parties.
According to him, this fee is 250 million. After receiving them, TsTP MOEK LLC will rewrite the contract, and the price of connecting to the highway will be 70 million rubles. Thus, JSC “Don-Stroy Invest” will “save” 80 million.
But there is, as the hackneyed joke says, one caveat: all these “opportunities to negotiate” were thought out from the very beginning and had one and only goal – to swindle the beneficiaries of Don-Stroy Invest JSC for money.
200 million rollback through Mosenergo
Moreover, Khorev’s group in the structures of Mosenergo and he himself received only 200 million from the rollback. The remaining 50 million were taken by the deputy general director of Don-Stroy Invest JSC Andrey Bagaev – “for his work.” Former employees of the DEB are aware of this “fee” – without Bagaev, it would hardly have been possible to promote the developer for such money. And even if it had been possible, it is still unknown how much outsiders would not have been present during its transfer – for example, Khorev’s former colleagues.
And so everyone is happy. Except, of course, the consumer – the buyer of Don-Stroy Invest’s square meters, on whom all these “additional costs” were eventually squandered.
By the way, the described scheme is by no means unique. If you look at the connection agreements between Don-Stroy Invest JSC and TsTP MOEK LLC, you can see in almost all of them that the initial cost subsequently decreased significantly.
