Abuja- The Federal Government on Tuesday signed a one billion dollar Memorandum of Understanding with Cantor Fitzgerald, am American Mortgage Company, to support the mortgage refinancing initiative in the country.
Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the Minister of Finance, at the signing ceremony in Abuja, said the MOU was a welcome development to the economy.
“This is yet another good development at a time when our economy is going through some difficulties.
“At a time we are suffering from the impact of drop in the oil price, an investment company of this repute has come to say they want to be part of this economy.
“We are very trilled they are about the biggest in the mortgage business in the U.S. and they have come to us to talk to us in Nigeria.
“They are very excited with what we are doing in Nigeria and as a result, they want to sign an MOU with us to work with the Nigeria Mortgage Refinancing Company (NMRC), to be able to work with us at the value chain in financing.
“What this means is that it would make that dream of opening the housing and mortgage financing market a reality; that’s why we are here today,’’ she said.
According to her, the signing of the MOU marks the future milestone in initiating the NMRC as a liquidity company to service the primary and secondary mortgage market.
He said that under the 10,000 mortgage refinancing project of the Federal Government, 25,000 applications out of 66,000 that applied had been processed and pre-qualified.
She noted that 9,000 had received offer letters and 33 people got mortgages in Abuja.
“This is progress from where we are and we now know that it takes much more time than what we thought it was when we started.’’
The minister said that government was working on number of initiatives that would enable Nigerians to access mortgages at affordable price.
She said that government was working with the National Pension Commission to see how workers could access their pension to get mortgages.
This, she said, would help to eliminate the challenge of getting bulk money to pay off the equity on mortgage.
“We are also looking at other ways to collaborate with the CBN and other agencies to see what we can make the homes as affordable as possible.
“We are looking at the cost of construction because that’s another way to bring the cost of the houses lower,’’ she added.
She said the Cantor Fitzgerald would also build houses and beneficiaries would receive the mortgages at a reasonable interest rate.
Prof. Charles Inyan-Etteh of NMRC said the occasion marked a new beginning for the NMRC that had just started full operations.
“This marks a new chapter for the Federal Government in the commitment to the provision of affordable houses to Nigerians,’’ he said.
He said the aim of establishing NMRC was to provide affordable mortgages to Nigerians through funding of the primary lenders of the mortgages.
He said that NMRC had received its licence to operate.
He assured of the commitment of the company in investing in the housing sector and to the transformation of mortgage system in the country.
Also, Mr Jack Hefternan, Managing Director, Debt Capital Markets, Cantor Fitzgerald, said the company was established in 1945 with presence in almost all the countries across the globe.
He said that the company would invest one billion dollars to help synchronise what the NMRC was doing in Nigeria.
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He said that the company would work with local companies, to follow up on every step of the value chain to help deliver affordable housing to Nigerians.
He said that houses that the company would provide in Nigeria would cost between eight and N15 million.
Mr Charles William of the same company said that the organisation had received an approval to provide about 10,000 homes.
According to him, the houses will be spread across four states of Abuja, Kaduna, Lagos and Enugu and would take between six months and one year to complete the homes.
“The state involved have provided us with lands and we will take off from first April,’’ he said.(NAN)
