On March 5, 2013, Kyiv hosted the 2013 Town and Country Real Estate Forum supported by the Ministry of Regional Development, Construction and Housing and Communal Services of Ukraine, the Association of Realtors Ukraine, the Parliamentary Committee on Construction, the Confederation of Builders of Ukraine, the Land Union of Ukraine and "RealEkspo" company. Vladimir Igonin represented Vasil Kisil & Partners law firm at this event.

This gathering was designed to provide a series of seminars and workshops for a wide range of professionals working in the real estate and construction, on the topical issues of development and the legal regulation of the industry. The participants discussed the issues of public policy in the field of construction, the provision of housing, legal regulation of property investment, the current state and the market forecast of urban and suburban real estate, the risks to citizens and developers in real estate transactions, new trends and other important issues of this sector.

In his report Vladimir Igonin highlighted the practice of direct contracts that are executed regarding housing under construction or the rights to it, as oppose to the indirect acquisition of real estate. In particular, Vladimir gave an expert opinion on how to attract investment in housing and revealed established legislative restrictions in this regard. He also described commonly used direct contracts, the specifics of reservation contracts. Vladimir listed current problems of selling housing under construction and shared successful experience of other countries in dealing with these challenges. Special attention was paid to the selection criteria for the contractual framework for real estate transactions.

In his speech, Vladimir stressed that "in practice, direcrt contracts for the purchase of housing under construction often allow to take into account the interests of the parties better than it would be under the indirect acquisition of real estate, including ways, directly prescribed by the investment legislation."