Samara Wheelchair User Loses Home After Fake Sale

Journalist 63.RU was approached by Yuliya Shevchenko. Her mother Lyudmila Mikhailovna Tityayeva is a 72-year-old wheelchair user. Until 2014, she was the sole owner of apartment No. 6 at 35 Krasnodonskaya Street in Samara. The apartment came to her by inheritance.

— In 2014, I had a husband. We decided to help his sister solve her financial problems, — says Yuliya. — We made a fictitious deal: we transferred the apartment to the sister's three children. Nobody paid a kopeck at that time. The contract stated a sum of 1,715,000 rubles (approximately $20,200 at current rates), but in fact no money was transferred. We just helped relatives.

All this time, Lyudmila Mikhailovna and her daughter continued living in the apartment. They paid utilities and made repairs. The keys were never handed over to the buyers, and the buyers never moved in. For 12 years, no one demanded eviction or asserted their rights.

House No. 35 fell within the boundaries of the KRT (Integrated Territorial Development) project being carried out by the Tyumen company Paritet. In total, within the KRT in Bezymyanka, 43 houses on Svobody, Kirova Avenue, Pobedy, Krasnodonskaya, and Volskaya streets are planned for resettlement. According to the schedule published by the developer, resettlement should be completed by 2029.

The developer has already begun resettlement. And then the fictitious buyers of the apartment 'came to life'. They approached the developer for compensation. And… they received the money.

— The developer, knowing the whole situation, quickly wrapped everything up, — says Yuliya. — Roughly speaking, my ex-husband's sister sold them the apartment. And we were simply thrown out onto the street.

Now Lyudmila Mikhailovna and her daughter live in an unimproved house outside the city.

— I took my mother away so she wouldn't be involved in this situation, — explains Yuliya. — She has huge health problems. I only give her 10% of the information, because for a 72-year-old she has many illnesses. She wouldn't survive all this.

Now a trial is underway in the Promyshlenny District Court of Samara. Yuliya is trying to prove that the 2014 deal was fictitious. That it was a sham transaction made without any intention of creating legal consequences. After all, no money was received. The buyers never moved in. And Yuliya's family continued living in the apartment for 12 years.

— The neighbors will all confirm that my mother lived there, — says Yuliya. — The father of the defendant and my ex-husband too — they are all on my side. Everyone confirms that she has nothing to do with this apartment. She doesn't even know where the bathroom is!

Yuliya says the developer is acting very cleverly. They have strong lawyers. They don't get in touch, they don't compromise. They just pay and evict.

— The developer has already paid the fictitious owners, — she says. — And they are now trying to deregister me. Court hearings have been postponed three times.

On July 14, 2026, another hearing took place. But, as Yuliya said, the court refused interim measures. The question of invalidating the transaction was not considered on its merits — the hearing was postponed to August 18.

Yuliya emphasizes that she is not trying to get money for the apartment. She is trying to restore justice.

— I am still registered there, — she says. — They sawed off the locks, I have no access. Thank God they at least open up so I can pick up my mother's walker. We picked up the wheelchair and some of our things. But it's just unfair. Those who have already been transferred the money have unlawfully enriched themselves by millions of rubles (hundreds of thousands of dollars at current rates).

Yuliya filed a complaint with the police. It was certified by the local police officer. She also filed a complaint with the prosecutor's office.

According to open data, similar court disputes are not uncommon. In Samara courts, cases are heard regarding the invalidation of purchase and sale agreements as sham transactions, where courts often side with bona fide buyers if there is confirmation of actual payment and transfer of the apartment.

For example, in one case, the regional court refused a woman the return of an apartment sold under the 'Dolina scheme'. The court concluded that the seller was legally competent, understood the contract, and independently disposed of the proceeds. In another case, the buyer was able to defend her rights because the pensioner admitted that she had staged a 'performance' before the deal.

In Tityayeva's case, the situation is different: there is no bona fide buyer, but a fictitious deal between relatives that was not contested for 12 years. But then the developer appeared — and everything changed.

Recall that the Paritet project in Bezymyanka provides for the construction of 3,554 apartments, a kindergarten for 240 children, and a school for 900 students.

— Every such case is individual, so only a court can give a final assessment after examining all the evidence.

If it is established that the purchase and sale agreement was concluded only formally, without the intention to actually transfer the apartment, that the money was not actually transferred, the buyers never moved in, and the seller continued to live in the apartment and pay utilities, this may indicate signs of a sham transaction. However, each of these facts in itself is not an unconditional basis for invalidating the contract — the court assesses them collectively.

If the transaction is declared invalid, the question of applying the consequences of invalidity will arise, including who has rights to the property and how the situation with the monetary compensation already paid by the developer should be resolved.

As for the developer's possible liability, it depends on whether it acted in good faith. If the payment was made to persons registered in the Unified State Register of Real Estate as owners, it is premature to talk about a violation of the law. A different assessment is only possible if it is proven that the developer knew about the fictitiousness of the transaction or the existence of a dispute, but still made the payment.

The main difficulty of this case is that more than ten years have passed since the contract was concluded. The court will have to assess not only the circumstances of the transaction itself, but also the issue of the statute of limitations. The outcome of the trial will largely depend on the totality of these circumstances.