Government takes developer role in 4PH program

MANILA, Philippines — The government will be taking over the real estate developer’s role in the Pambansang Pabahay Para sa Pilipino Housing (4PH) program to make housing units more affordable, Department of Human Settlements and Urban Development (DHSUD) Secretary Jose Rizalino Acuzar said.

In a press briefing at Malacañang, Acuzar said the DHSUD’s key shelter agencies – the Social Housing Finance Corp. (SHFC) and the National Housing Authority (NHA) – are taking over the direct contracting of construction services for the 4PH program.

Acuzar said the move “aims to eliminate the cost of hiring developers and enable the sovereign guarantee to minimize its coverage.”

“What will happen now is that after the loan is released, SHFC and NHA will start entering into direct contracts for the construction. No more developer’s [services] needed. With this system, we can save some amount because ‘developer’s profit’ will be eliminated,” Acuzar said.

“Because, you know, if you are a developer, you will still hire a contractor for the construction of the building. So, part of the profit will go to the developer. But with this new system, the government will serve as the developer, we will go straight to the contractors. So, we just have to deal with contractor’s profit,” he said.

Furthermore, Acuzar said the NHA and SHFC will also assume other roles of developers such as in-house planning for small projects, particularly in creating standard designs for housing but with different facades “to reduce monotony.”

Acuzar said the hiring of private designers would only be done for bigger projects.

“I was a developer before. I used to hire private architects to design our development (projects). But the NHA and SHFC have in-house planning units. So now, if the (4PH) projects are big or complicated that will be the only time that we will be hiring private designers,” Acuzar said.

“The NHA and SHFC’s in-house planning can do the design for smaller projects. These are professionals that can render standard designs so that there will be uniformity in our units, though the facade of the units may vary,” he added.

Acuzar said the main goal of the new system is to further lower the cost of the 4PH housing unit to make it affordable to the beneficiaries.

“This is why the roles of developers in capitalization and pre-selling are eliminated. Besides, they are no longer necessary because the market already exists,” Acuzar said.

“If we can’t lower the cost, the indigent beneficiaries won’t be able to afford a unit. Real estate development projects really have a huge price difference or mark-up. It will be very hard for our poor beneficiaries to adapt to such a price,” Acuzar said.