At the end of October 2021, Olha Stepanenko resigned from the tax service and within a month became a co-owner of three apartments with a total area of 280 square meters in a business-class residential complex in the center of Kyiv. In her declaration, the official indicated that the purchases cost her about USD 50,000. That is, one square meter of real estate cost a little more than USD 350. Such a low price attracted the attention of the Suspilne investigative editorial office when we were reviewing information about the members of the working group on assessing corruption risks in the activities of the State Tax Service of Ukraine. Olha Stepanenko is not in this group, but her husband Viktor Stepanenko is.
From our own sources, we received copies of the purchase and sale agreements for the aforementioned apartments and found out that two of them had been the subject of legal disputes for a considerable time before they became the property of the former official.
We are publishing this story because we consider public control to be one of the key tools that allows identifying potential abuses of office or possible hidden sources of income.
The family of tax officials
Olha Stepanenko worked in the fiscal service from at least 2016. This is evidenced by the electronic declarations submitted by her. Until 2019, she held the positions of senior operational officer of the headquarters and operational officer of the operational department in the Mariupol United State Tax Inspectorate of the Main Directorate of the State Fiscal Service in Donetsk region. From the second half of 2020, she held the position of senior operational officer for especially important cases of the Main Directorate of the State Fiscal Service in Donetsk region. She resigned in October 2021.
Her husband, Viktor Stepanenko, also worked in the fiscal service, but in Kyiv region. He held the position of senior operational officer for especially important cases. In early 2022, after the reorganization of the State Fiscal Service, he was promoted to head of the section of technical and analytical support of the risk operations monitoring division of the Risk Management Department of the State Tax Service of Ukraine. He still holds this position.
As the head of the section, Viktor Stepanenko has been a member of the working group on assessing corruption risks in the activities of the State Tax Service since 2022.
Olha Stepanenko did not return to civil service after resigning. A month later, on November 18, 2021, together with Nataliia Mushka, an entrepreneur from Uzhhorod, she acquired the right to joint partial ownership of three apartments in a residential complex at 2b Dilova Street in Kyiv. On sales websites, this residential complex, which is located next to the Olympic Stadium, is called a business-class residential complex.
In the annual declaration, which officials submit even after resigning, the woman listed the objects and indicated their value as of the date of acquisition of ownership:
— an apartment with an area of 60.9 square meters cost 287.5 thousand hryvnias (almost 10.9 thousand dollars at the then exchange rate);
— an apartment with an area of 101.3 square meters cost 485 thousand hryvnias (USD 18.3 thousand);
— an apartment with an area of 118 square meters cost 537.5 thousand hryvnias (USD 20.3 thousand).
In total, the three apartments cost about 50 thousand US dollars.
However, Stepanenko indicated in her declaration not the value of the real estate as of the date of acquisition of ownership, but the amounts she paid for her shares in these apartments.
From our own source, we received copies of the purchase and sale agreements for these apartments. Their value is exactly twice as much as it is stated in the official’s declaration: 575,000 hryvnias, 970,000 hryvnias, and 1.075 million hryvnias, respectively.
According to the contract, the purchase of three apartments officially cost the women 2.62 million hryvnias, or almost 99 thousand dollars. Therefore, the cost per square meter was a little more than 350 dollars. The women bought apartments from the Kyiv-based “Westpalm” LLC.
The apartments were bought in a month after the arrest had been lifted
The apartments, which ended up in the ownership of former tax official Stepanenko and Uzhhorod entrepreneur Mushka, were the cause of lengthy legal proceedings of several legal entities.
As we learned from publicly available court decisions, in 2004, PJSC “Automobile Company “Ukrtrans” received a 1.22 million euro loan from JSCB “Kyiv” for the construction of a residential building at 2b Dilova Street. In 2008, the company transferred property rights to a number of apartments in mortgage. After the bankruptcy of Bank “Kyiv” in 2015, its assets, including the right to mortgage claim, were transferred to Ukrgasbank. The latter sold the right to mortgage claim and, after several transactions, in 2020, the apartments became the property of the “Westpalm” company.
In January 2021, “Investgarant” LLC claimed ownership of these apartments by filing a lawsuit. The company claimed that in 2005-2012 it invested 3.23 million hryvnias in the construction of four apartments (two of which are now owned by Stepanenko and Mushka).
At the request of “Investgarant” LLC, the Kyiv Commercial Court imposed an arrest on the apartments on July 22, 2021. However, on October 18, the Northern Commercial Court of Appeal lifted this arrest upon the application of “Westpalm”. In a month, two apartments were sold to Olha Stepanenko and Nataliia Mushka.
During 2022-2024, the “Investgarant” case went through all court instances, and new apartment co-owners were added to the case. In October 2024, the company asked the court to leave the lawsuit without consideration.
In a comment to Suspilne, Oleksii Boiko, a lawyer for the NGO “Anti-Corruption Center”, noted that the plaintiff has an unconditional right to leave the lawsuit without consideration.
“Why did they actually abandon the protection of their rights to these assets? We can only speculate here: excessive burden of court costs for legal aid, martial law, some agreements with the current owners (regarding partial compensation for the value of these objects). In fact, there are many options, but only the participants in this case know about this. The only thing that objectively follows from this is that there is currently no dispute regarding the rights to the aforementioned apartments. Of course, leaving the claim without consideration does not deprive you of the right to apply to court again, but from September 4, 2025, the time limitations will be restored, and therefore, after a certain time, re-filing this claim will no longer make sense,” says Boiko.
During the conversation, the expert also drew attention to another aspect:
“The main question is how exactly these individuals (Stepanenko and Mushka – Ed.) found out about the sale of these apartments. Because if the search for buyers had been carried out more or less openly, there would have been a queue at such a low price,” says Boiko.
What is the market price per square meter in the residential complex at 2b Dilova Street?
According to the data from the “Investgarant” LLC claims, we calculated that as of 2012, a square meter in this residential complex cost the company $718 – twice the price that Stepanenko and Mushka paid in 2021.
We also found several archive advertisements for the sale of apartments in this building. The cheapest attempt to sell an apartment without renovation in the residential complex was through the “Prozorro.Sale” platform in August 2022. The auction for an apartment with an area of 131 square meters started at 4.86 million hryvnias. That is, at the then exchange rate, a square meter cost approximately 1,380 dollars.
In January 2021, a renovated apartment was put on sale for $260,000, or $2,000 per square meter.
In August 2025, five apartments without renovation at 2b Dilova Street were on sale with an average of $1,442 per square meter. The average price per square meter of a renovated apartment during this period was $2,332.
Independent real estate expert and consultant Yevhen Polunov told Suspilne that as of 2021, in the Pechersk district of Kyiv, which includes Dilova Street, apartments on the primary market cost USD 2,500-3,000 per square meter.
“Legally, the seller has the right to sell own assets at a price below a market one, but there must be reasons for this. Situational reasons, for example. From a business point of view, some benefit must outweigh the sale at a price below a market one,” Polunov explains the possible motivation for the price of $350 per square meter.
According to the expert, purchasing property at undervalued prices with documentary evidence of this fact is also common when buyers have to declare their property status.
Did the family have enough money to buy apartments?
According to the Stepanenko’s declaration, her share in all the apartments is 50%, which is why the woman paid half of the price indicated in the purchase and sale agreements. This was UAH 1.31 million, or about $50,000 at the exchange rate as of November 2021.
If Stepanenko had bought an apartment at the then lowest market price that we found ($1,380 per square meter), she would have paid about $190,000.
We analyzed all the declarations of Olha and Viktor Stepanenko from 2016 to 2021. According to them, Viktor Stepanenko received 1.23 million hryvnias in salary and 110 thousand hryvnias as a gift from his father Anatolii Stepanenko during this period.
During her six years of work in the tax office, Olha Stepanenko declared her salary only twice: 46 thousand hryvnias in 2018 and 87 thousand in 2021. We can assume that the woman was on maternity leave.
On June 17, 2020, Olha Stepanenko received and declared a cash gift from 87-year-old Borys Bychkovskyi – about 1.34 million hryvnias ($50,000 at the National Bank exchange rate for the date of the gift). In addition, in 2021, she indicated in her declaration that she received 2.72 million hryvnias as a cash gift from 89-year-old Ivan Yarmolenko, her paternal grandfather. This is about 100,000 dollars.
Judging by the fact that Viktor Stepanenko’s declarations for subsequent years show an equivalent amount as savings, the Stepanenko family did not spend these funds on the purchase of apartments.
It is unknown whether Ivan Yarmolenko had any real funds. He was not engaged in entrepreneurial activity. We only managed to find information that in 2014 he was receiving income from the Scientific Center for Mining Geology, Geoecology, and Infrastructure Development of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.
Olha Stepanenko also inherited property in 2020 and 2021. In January 2020, she inherited an apartment with an area of 86.5 square meters and a parking space in the residential complex “Ostrovskyi, 40” and an apartment with an area of 76.8 square meters in the residential complex “Leader”. The property came from her father, Serhii Yarmolenko. It is known that her father was not engaged in business and, as of 2014, was also receiving income from the Scientific Center for Mining Geology, Geoecology, and Infrastructure Development of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.
In addition, in April 2021, Olha Stepanenko inherited from the already mentioned Borys Bychkovskyi a parking space, an apartment in the “Oleksandria” residential complex, and another apartment in the “Elyseum” business-class residential complex. It can be assumed that the man may be Stepanenko’s maternal grandfather.
During 2022-2023, Viktor Stepanenko declared only his income. In July 2024, his wife was registered as an individual entrepreneur with the main type of activity “leasing and operating own or leased real estate”. In less than a year, Olha Stepanenko, according to her husband’s declaration, earned about 345 thousand hryvnias.
When asked to comment, the Stepanenkos said to send them an information request
We contacted Olha Stepanenko for comment on the purchase of apartments at a low price. She refused to comment by phone, and in a message, she indicated that she was ready to communicate physically or by email, but would provide a comment after we send documents “certifying the right to journalistic activity and authorization from the media to conduct an investigation”.
We sent questions to the email address provided by her. We received a response via WhatsApp only to one of the questions:
“Real estate cannot be purchased from someone other than the property owner, since any real estate transaction is preceded by an extract from the state register of real estate, which indicates the owner, the grounds for acquiring ownership, and the absence of restrictions. Therefore, the fact that real estate transactions took place indicates that the seller was the registered owner of the property, as well as that there were no restrictions/encumbrances on the property at the time of the transaction. All other questions in your request do not involve comments from my side, but are an information request, which must be submitted in accordance with the Law,” Stepanenko wrote.
However, the Law of Ukraine “On Access to Public Information”, to which the former official is probably referring, has a clear list of managers of such information, Stepanenko as an individual cannot be included in this list. That is why we asked her to comment, not to provide information at our request.
Viktor Stepanenko also refused to comment. “As far as I know, she (Olha – Ed.) has already told you what format further communication will take. Write a proper letter, a request, send it officially, and we will consider it. I have no desire to talk to you by phone, tell you anything, any personal data that concerns me, my wife, my family. And I do not know who you are, it is an unknown [for me] phone number. You say that you are Ihor, but you may be a fraud,” he replied.
When asked about his membership in the group that assesses corruption risks in the activities of the State Tax Service of Ukraine, Stepanenko also did not answer, citing “security considerations”. He advised to send an official request to the leadership.
“I do not know how the owner calculated the price of the apartments”
As for Nataliia Mushka, with whom Olha Stepanenko jointly bought apartments on Dilova Street, according to the YouControl analytical system, the woman is the director and beneficiary of a number of companies in the agricultural sector, and has shares in the construction and restaurant businesses in Zakarpattia. For the past six years, she has also been registered as an individual entrepreneur with the main type of activity “Wholesale of fruits and vegetables”.
Three apartments, which she co-owns with Stepanenko, is not the only real estate of Mushka in the house at 2b Dilova Street in Kyiv. On September 27, 2021, she (also in co-ownership) purchased an apartment with an area of 182 square meters from “Westpalm” LLC. This apartment was also the subject of a legal dispute between “Westpalm” and “Investgarant”. In addition to it, Mushka bought three more apartments in co-ownership in 2021-2022.
In a telephone conversation with us, Nataliia Mushka said that she knew Olha Stepanenko, but did not specify the details. Mushka explained the price of $350 per square meter by the “reconstruction, issues and problems” of the object. When asked to specify problems, she advised us to “look for questions” and not look at the declaration.
Later, we sent a detailed list of questions regarding the purchase of apartments. In a written response, Nataliia Mushka noted that she bought the apartments on Dilova Street together with a former tax official because of the attractive price offered by the owner.
“I do not know how the owner calculated the price of the apartments and it is difficult to explain, since the owner at that time was a legal entity. I do not know at what price they acquired ownership and under what circumstances they made the decision to sell the apartments. At the time of signing the contract, the ownership of the apartments belonged to the seller, as evidenced by an extract from the register of real estate owners, which was formed by a notary,” Mushka said.
The Uzhhorod entrepreneur did not answer questions about the legal disputes regarding the apartments and whether she knew about them at the time of purchase. The questions about possible agreements with “Investgarant” LLC also remained unanswered.
We tried to contact the phone numbers of “Westpalm” LLC listed in the public domain, as well as the company’s director, Oleksandr Derevianko, but all phone numbers were inactive. Therefore, we sent our questions in a message. By the time of publication of the article, we had not received a response.
Roman Polishchuk, director of “Investgarant” LLC, after listening to the questions, refused to comment and hung up. He did not respond to further calls. We messaged him our questions and duplicated them to the company’s phone number listed in the state register of legal entities. By the time of publication, there had been no response.
This material was created as part of the “School of Investigative Journalism” program from the educational initiative Kyiv Media School.
This publication was funded by the European Union. Its contents are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the European Union.
