“My friends called me and said, ‘Katya, someone is living in your apartment’,” said Kateryna, 44, from the occupied village of Novotroitske in the Kherson region. “I asked who and they said ‘We don’t know, but the lights are always on, and they’ve moved their stuff in.”
Kateryna saved for years to buy her apartment and had just renovated it before the full-scale invasion. She believes her neighbors, collaborating with the Russian administration, denounced her. Her son is serving in Ukraine’s armed forces and they knew they wouldn’t be returning soon.
Her friends are too afraid to confront the occupation administration, while other people she knows are working with the occupiers.
Kateryna asked an acquaintance who is collaborating why people are living in her apartment. “You left,” he replied. “I left because of Russia’s war, and now they claim I abandoned my home,” she said, fighting back tears.
Natalia, 60, from Mariupol, faces a similar situation. Neighbors warned her that if she didn’t register her house with the local occupation administration within a month, it would be labeled as abandoned.
“Chechen people lived in the house; it was filthy,” Natalia said, her voice trembling with memories of February and March 2022. A piano teacher, she managed to flee with her mother to Lviv, and later her daughter-in-law escaped with three children. Natalia still doesn’t know what happened to her son.
“I can’t even sell the house because I can’t pass the filtration in Sheremetyevo,” she says, referring to the airport Ukrainians have had to use to reach Mariupol since October 2023.
For many, it’s a real trap: they can’t return to the occupied territories, nor can they sell their property. At Sheremetyevo, Ukrainians face a grueling filtration process lasting from hours to days, involving fingerprinting, photos, phone checks, and interviews.
Even if they successfully navigate filtration, not everyone gets to Mariupol. There have been cases of Ukrainians who own expensive properties being denied passage at checkpoints. Seniors without social media who were unable to complain, and those whose property had already been labeled “ownerless” faced similar issues.
Since March 2024, the Russians have intensified efforts to deprive Ukrainians of their homes, a practice that started at the invasion’s outset, says Petro Andriushchenko, an adviser to the legitimate mayor of Mariupol and an exiled resident of the city.
The scheme is simple: label housing as ownerless and nationalize it. To prevent this, property owners must first obtain a Russian passport, and then confirm ownership of the property in person — a challenge for those who lost papers during the full-scale invasion or can’t return to Mariupol or any other occupied settlement. Without this confirmation, the property is transferred to municipal ownership before being auctioned, rented, or given to citizens loyal to the occupiers.
“Until March, this wasn’t moving at all. Now, it’s been accelerated to place Russian military and public servants in these homes for free,” Andriushchenko said.
Every quarter, 1,000-1,200 apartments are declared ownerless, in a calculated effort to relocate more Russians to Ukraine, Andriushchenko said. Russian forces are aiming to complete the process by the end of the year as part of the Kremlin’s strategy to fully Russify the occupied territories, he added.
“Even if a person tries to re-register and then leave the temporarily occupied territory, their property can still be ‘nationalized’ again,” Andriushchenko said. “There are traitors who record comings and goings and file denunciations. They nationalize property simply because someone supports the Armed Forces of Ukraine.”
In Kherson Oblast, the occupation administration openly reallocates Ukrainian apartments. “With thousands of vacant homes due to people leaving and never returning, we offer free housing to incoming specialists,” said Pavlo Filipchuk, the Russian-appointed governor of Kakhovka Municipal District.
Even if someone stays in the occupied territories, it doesn’t necessarily mean they will be recognized as the owner of their property. Tetyana Trofymchuk, a resident of Donetsk, said she didn’t leave but still had no rights to her home. She was stunned to learn her apartment had been “under arrest” since September 2022, when the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic adopted a law on the transfer of objects of strategic importance into state ownership.
“I have been living in an apartment under arrest for more than two years,” she said. “I inherited it after my mother’s death, I have all the documents confirming the right of ownership in my hands. Why am I not the owner of my home?”
Another man recounted a similar situation in a video produced by a Ukrainian blogger. He had all the necessary documents but the property was seized by the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic.
“They’ve stolen at least 200,000 apartments this way, and according to my information, more than 300,000,” said Denis Kazansky, a Ukrainian blogger and journalist. “This amounts to about half of all apartments in the occupied territories. It’s not just a few apartments being seized and looted; it’s large-scale robbery.”
While Russian-appointed governors focus on schemes to seize Ukrainian property, Ukrainians are trying to find solutions. In June 2024, Ukrainian MPs voted on compensation for destroyed property in the occupied territories.
Internally Displaced People whose homes were destroyed must file their details with the International Register of Damages. This data will form the basis for reparations Russia must pay to the property owners.
Kateryna, uncertain of returning to Kherson Oblast, hopes her home is taken out of the hands of the occupiers. “I know it’s wrong to say it, but I pray the house gets destroyed in a counter-offensive so the Russians get nothing,” she said.
Meanwhile, Natalia still holds out hope for compensation: “I want to own something in Ukrainian-controlled territory,” she said. “We’re living like gypsies.”
Elina Beketova is a Democracy Fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis, focusing on the occupied territories of Ukraine. She worked as a journalist, editor, and TV anchor for various news stations in Kharkiv and Kyiv.
Europe’s Edge is CEPA’s online journal covering critical topics on the foreign policy docket across Europe and North America. All opinions expressed on Europe’s Edge are those of the author alone and may not represent those of the institutions they represent or the Center for European Policy Analysis. CEPA maintains a strict intellectual independence policy across all its projects and publications.
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