Russians buy nearly 3,000 apartments in Georgia since March

Russians buying apartments in Georgia

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Russian citizens have purchased 2,964 apartments and 37.9 hectares of land in Georgia. Russian citizens have also registered 711 legal entities, and 9,789 have received the status of individual entrepreneur. The data were distributed by the journal “Batumelebi” with reference to the national agency of the state registry.

The figures were culled from Russian passport data.

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According to the “Information Development Institute” (IDFI), a total of 1,598 people received Georgian citizenship in the first seven months of 2022, of whom 723 were citizens of Russia. After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, 551 citizens of Russia and eight citizens of Ukraine received citizenship of Georgia by exception.

According to IDFI data, from February 24 to August 31, 45,349 citizens of Russia opened accounts in Georgian commercial banks. As the organization explains, the opening of this number of accounts indicates that this is not simply tourism, but migration. IDFI requested data from the National Bank.

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According to the statistics of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, 511% more Russians entered Georgia this year than last year. According to official data, in September 2022, 222,274 citizens of Russia crossed the Russian-Georgian border. The Ministry does not indicate how many of them have left Georgia for third countries.

Protests have been held in Georgia to demand a visa policy for Russians. One such protest was called “Close the border”. The Georgian authorities have repeatedly stated that they do not support the introduction of the visa policy and consider such a measure “irrational”.