Astana, 3 November. Otbasy Bank accepted applications for the second tranche of the women’s mortgage Umai, 20 billion tenge, and closed intake the same day at 16:00: 850 applications for the full amount came in during the day, 352 of them through the bank’s consultants, the bank said.
By 15:00 the bank had accepted 524 applications for 12.5 billion tenge. All women whose applications were accepted received a preliminary approval valid for a month: within that time they must choose a home and submit a loan application.
The second tranche was more than twice as large as the first, yet it closed at the same hour: 16:00, as on 31 August. The bank added that 390 participants submitted loan applications for 9.5 billion tenge the same day; they have three months to complete the loan. The bank called the past day an intermediate stage of the programme: the other women will be able to take part in later stages, when new tranches from the Asian Development Bank arrive, and the bank will announce the dates of the next intake separately.
The money for Umai comes from the Asian Development Bank. In April 2026 Otbasy Bank signed a 90-billion-tenge loan agreement with it for two programmes, Umai and the Green Mortgage. The first tranche of 9 billion tenge arrived in August, and intake on 31 August ended within seven hours, when 855 applications came in, about a hundred of them online. According to figures given by Nege.kz, 435 loans worth 8.6 billion tenge had been issued from the first tranche as of 3 November.
The terms of the second stage were not repeated in the bank’s statement. At the first stage the maximum loan was 50 million tenge, the down payment was from 20% in Astana and Almaty and from 15% elsewhere, the term was up to 25 years and the rate was 14.8% a year (annual effective rate of 16.3% to 16.8%). Before the second stage the bank said it was reviewing the rate and the limit because the base rate had changed.
In Almaty a queue formed outside a branch on launch day: a social media user posted a video. The bank explained the crowd by heavy load. Before the launch, board chair Lyazzat Ibragimova said the bank had heard the women who failed to apply on 31 August and added another way to submit a loan application.
What it means: Demand for a subsidised mortgage for working women still exceeds the Asian Development Bank’s money: both tranches, 9 and 20 billion tenge, went within hours. A preliminary approval means a place in the queue for a loan, not a home: before a deal you must find an apartment and submit a loan application in time.
Who benefits: According to the bank, the winners are the women who received preliminary approval: they have time to choose a home. The rest must wait for the next tranches, and the bank names no dates. The funding comes from the Asian Development Bank, and the loan is issued by Otbasy Bank.
Background: The Umai programme has run since 2021. According to Ibragimova, 3,659 loans were issued under it in 2021–2023, of which 3,004 are active and 655 were repaid early.
