By Mashe Umaru Gwamna
The federal government has initiated National Housing Bond for better delivery of affordable housing to Nigerians .
Minister for Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola said there was need to improved housing finance for housing sector .
Fashola made the disclosure at the Housing Investment Forum held in Abuja yesterday,with the theme:” Exploring the option of National Housing Bond for Housing Development of Public -Private sector collaboration.
He stated that the aim of the housing bond was to raise Captial that will be used to finance and develop housing infrastructure in Nigeria.
“This will facilitate the provision of adequate and affordable housing for Nigeria in both urban and rural areas in a secure, healthy and decent environment”.
According to him,the idea was proposed by SignaturesAdvisory Limited in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing .
“This is about building economy in housing sector for people to plan to live around it”.
The Minister give insight on the benefits the National Housing Bond will afford to the government.
He explained that the initiative will increase foreign and domestic investment and development expansion in to the secondary cities. Markets will deepen the Captial markets with the introduction of new bond type.
“ Real estate developers will get cheaper source of financing that will drive expansion and increase project profitability.Consumer will get more afford housing that meets international building standards”,he said.
He said the rapid emerge of private sector cooperation in the housing sector is very impressive.
“ There is a a lot of work to do still to bridge in the gap and any obstacle, we have to overcome to have a purposefully journey for Nigeria housing sector”.
Also speaking, the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, said housing has been a major challenges that has remained unsolved, although there is no shortage in policy and programms.
“The two major challenges is the new housing supply to meet-growing nation of urban migration and renewing substandard housing that does not meet the existing standard of habitation“.
Ahmed who was represented by Managing Director Family Homes Fund, Femi Adewole,noted that ,the FG has spend200billion for National social housing programme which is aimed at delivering homes to low and medium incomes earners in Nigerian.
“ This is a 10years plan of National Housing strategy, that will ensure accessible housing finance for Nigeria. The programme will also provide 1.6 million Jobs with the state governments for people”.
She said the ministry of finance is ready to develop funds that will fit in to national housing bond purposes.
Similarly, the Managing Director/Chief Executive,Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria(FMBN)ARC. Ahmed Dangiwa, said there are numbers of challenges we faced through FMBN issuance of the 100billion mortgage backed bond for the acquisition of federal government houses allocated to civili servants as a result of the monetization policy in 2007.
“ Lesson from the endeavor must shape and guide our steps towards a successful outing for National Housing Bond .
Dangiwa reiterated that considering the current dynamics of our housing and mortgage finance environment.
“We must also foresee the role to be played by primary mortgage banks( PMBs) at the off -take end of the markets as well Real Estate Developers Association of Nigeria( REDAN).
“The Mortgage Banking Association of Nigeria(MBAN) the umbrella bodies of developers and mortgage banks respectively. We must envision this programme from end to end to ensure its success”, he stated.
The Director General, Debt Management Office(DMO), Patience Oniha, in her paper presentation,Tilted: Option of Floating the National Housing Bond,said housing sector is one of the critical economic sector of any country.
Oniha emphasized that, inspite government multi faceted approach, there is still a housing deficit particularly in the area of affordable housing.
“We are faced with different challenges such as relatively high population growth rate, inadequate funding or access to funding, relatively high cost of buildings and procedures for land acquisition and development”.
She said there are funding options to consider which are: investible funds available form fund manager and ethical funds, 30 years mortgage possible with a sovereign 30years FGN bond and refinancing offered by Nigeria mortgage refinancing company.
She maintained that,deficit in the housing sector needs to be bridged with emphasis on affordable housing and the landscape in the housing sector includes governments and private sector operators.
Meanwhile,Director General of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Lamido Yuguda,said his commission has played and will continue to play a role leading role in developing Captial market to support the housing sector as well as other critical sector in the Nigeria economy.
Yuguda represented by Temidayo Obisan , Executive Commissioner Operation said the commission has established a robust frame work to facilitate securities issuance to provide the much needed funding for housing needs in Nigeria.
