“However, we have observed that many of the houses in the city, with a large number of them in mass housing estates; have not been occupied many years after construction, which is not acceptable.
“To stop this trend, we plan to include a clause in the approval that would compel builders to rent out such houses not later than six months after completion,’’ he said.
But some real estate developers insisted that they could not take the blame for accommodation problems in the FCT.
They said that housing deficit in the country was due to high cost of land and cumbersome mortgage loan processes in the country.
Mr Benjamin Onuaku, the Marketing Executive, Netconctruct, an estate developer in Abuja, noted that the housing deficit had persisted because developers had no access to affordable lands.
He said cumbersome mortgage loan processes had not been favourable to workers who were interested in buying houses.
“The experience has been that when civil servants indicate interest to buy houses, the long period it takes to secure mortgage loans denies them the opportunity of buying such houses.
“When people who have available cash come to buy the same houses, they are sold to them immediately because the developers have to dispose of the houses,’’ he said.
Onuaku said a clause in the mortgage loan process such as the equity contributions, was a major obstacle for low income earners in accessing funds.
He, therefore, urged the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria to ease the processes of securing mortgage loans by the beneficiaries of the National Housing Fund.
He also observed that some houses in the FCT were locked by buyers who might not be ready to occupy them immediately.
“House owners put high price tags on their houses because of the initial cost of purchase and high cost of building materials.
“The houses are not occupied because the owners cannot rent them out at a loss,’’ he said.
In the light of this view, Mr Ahmed Usman, the spokesman for Global Assets Company Ltd, an estate developer, solicited greater collaboration between real estate developers and appropriate authorities in housing sector.
“If lands can be allocated directly to developers by the relevant authorities, the cost of houses will be reduced to enable both the high income and low income earners to buy them,’’ he said.
Observers note that efforts at making land allocation accessible could have stimulated the recent decision of the Minister of Housing, Lands and Urban Development, Mrs Akon Eyakenyi, to inaugurate committees to address the challenges of land allocation.
The committees are Verification and Auditing of Federal Government Lands and Landed Property in the 36 States of the Federation and the FCT; Presidential Initiative on the Delivery of 10,000 Housing Units under the Nigerian Mortgage Refinance Company and a committee on National Housing Survey.
The minister urged the committee to undertake comprehensive inventory and audit of Federal Government lands and landed property in all the states and the FCT.
She also directed the committee on National Housing Survey to ascertain the characteristics of the various housing estates developed by the ministry, Federal Housing Authority and the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria.
According to her, the committee will also ascertain the characteristics of houses developed by the Real Estate Development Association in the last four years.
Eyakenyi urged the committees to undertake a national housing survey in collaboration with all relevant stakeholders and recommend measures that should be taken to solve accommodation problems in the country.
All in all, observers believe that if the relevant authorities make pragmatic efforts at addressing housing deficit and they back them up with stronger political will, the questions that why many housing estates remain unoccupied in the FCT will not rise. (NANFeatures)
