MANILA, Philippines - The Board of Investments (BOI) is bent on solving the four million housing backlog of the country as it recently granted a three-year income tax holiday (ITH) to a major real estate developer, RCD Land Inc.
BoI has been offering the tax break as the national government required it to solve the backlog as soon as possible. According to data from the National Housing Authority, majority of the lack of houses are in the national capital region, Regions 3, 4 and 7 and Cordillera Administrative Region.
RCD Land, Inc., a firm with solid background in building affordable and quality socialized housing since 1997, is the most recent real estate developer that has afforded the three-year tax incentive in its 183-housing unit project in Silang, Cavite.
Rolando Delantar, RCD Land, Inc. president and chief executive officer, said the tax incentive helped his company realized some savings. Delantar added that the savings he incurred will help him bankroll more projects his firm is constructing.
The firm aims to get similar incentive so that the continuation of the Silang project, located in a two-hectare lot and composed of 175 units mostly socialized housing, will be completed in the scheduled timetable of three years.
The real estate firm is on full blast housing project buildup as it also has projects in San Jose Del Monte, Bulacan; Tui, Batangas; Tanay, Rizal; and Infanta, Quezon. Since starting its business, RCD Land, Inc. has already completed more than 3,000 quality and affordable housing units.
The firm constructs three housing classifications—socialized (with minimum cost of P450,000), economic (P.5 million to P1.25 million) and open (P1.3 million to P5 million).
Under its implementing rules and regulations, any firm that is registered at BoI can avail themselves of the ITH if its business falls under its investment priority plan, in which housing projects fall under BoI is a Department of Trade and Industry-attached agency.