Moscow--Yekaterina Kolotovkina choked back tears as she told how her world collapsed within a few short months.
In March, her husband died and she and her three-year-old son now risk being evicted from their Moscow apartment as she struggles to make payments.
In 2008, the 40-year-old took out a mortgage worth nearly $180,000 to buy a small apartment on the outskirts of the Russian capital. The monthly payments were fixed in US dollars.
Kolotovkina is one of tens of thousands of Russians who took out mortgages denominated in foreign currencies, lured by lower interest rates, in the years before the fallout of the Ukraine crisis and low oil prices ravaged the Russian economy.
As the value of the Russian ruble collapsed under the pressure of falling oil prices and Western sanctions last year, her $2,000 monthly installments doubled in ruble terms.
Kolotovkina's 52-year-old husband had been sick with worry that the family would no longer be able to make mortgage payments.
"He was very distressed. His blood pressure was going up and down," Kolotovkina told AFP. "He died of a stroke."
The economic crisis in Russia has spared few people, but foreign currency mortgage holders have been among those who have suffered most.
In recent months, they have struggled to keep up with payments that often exceed their families' monthly income.
They have slashed their spending, borrowed from friends and in some cases taken out additional bank loans.
Many feel trapped as selling is not even an option as they would still end up owing money to the bank.
They have also staged a number of pickets and flash mobs in Moscow and Saint Petersburg and bombarded their banks, officials and MPs with requests to recalculate their loans in rubles using the foreign currencies' pre-crisis exchange rate.
An Orthodox church in Moscow has held prayers in their support.
AFP
