From Longer Queues to Decreasing Resources: Is the Marriage Loan on the Verge of a Social Crisis?

According to the Economic Service of Saed News, quoting Fars, based on the 1404 (2025) budget law, banks are required to allocate a total of 350 trillion tomans for marriage and childbearing loans next year.

Yesterday, Mohsen Zanganeh, Deputy Chairman of the Parliament's Joint Commission, stated, “The Central Bank has objected to the amount of marriage loans in the Supreme Supervisory Board of the Expediency Council, claiming that Parliament has imposed an additional burden on us.”Mohsen Dehnavi, Head of the Strategic Monitoring and Evaluation Center of the Expediency Council, confirmed the Central Bank's correspondence with the Council but mentioned, "No decision has been made yet in this regard within the Council."

Last year, during the 1403 (2024) budget discussions, Parliament set the total ceiling for marriage and childbearing loans at 300 trillion tomans. However, according to the Head of the Joint Commission on Population Growth and Family Support, the Central Bank contacted the Expediency Council and managed to reduce this amount to 200 trillion tomans, cutting 100 trillion tomans from the banking network's obligations for these loans.According to the 1402 (2023) budget report, banks provided marriage loans to 772,883 people last year.This year, based on the latest statistics from the Central Bank released yesterday, 511,246 people have received marriage loans so far, while 480,000 people remain on the waiting list for these loans.

However, the total amount of marriage loans has surpassed the legal limit of 144 trillion tomans, and so far, 170 trillion tomans have been disbursed. This increase is due to an additional 50 trillion tomans allocated by the Central Bank from the statutory reserves of banks for marriage loans.These figures indicate that, at best, 80,000 applicants will receive loans by the end of the year, while 400,000 people in the queue will be carried over to the next year.Experts warn that if the Expediency Council agrees with the Central Bank's request to reduce the marriage loan amount, it could lead to a social crisis next year.

Previously, the Parliament Research Center suggested in a report on mandatory loans within the 1404 (2025) budget that Parliament should set a collective ceiling of 300 trillion tomans for marriage loans and 100 trillion tomans for childbearing loans to avoid a repeat of this year's challenges.