More funds for housing needed

Housing and real estate practitioners affiliated with the Private Consultative Council for Shelter (PCCS) have called on government and private banks including financial institutions such as the Social Security System (SSS) and the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) to commit funds this year for housing finance to boost homeownership and help attain the government housing targets.

A unified consultative and advocacy body for affordable housing, PCCS is composed of six major real estate organizations, including the National Real Estate Association; Women in Shelter and Its Environment; Organization of Socialized Housing Developers of the Philippines; Builders Alliance Toward Action (BATA); Chamber of Real Estate and Builders Association; and the Subdivision and Housing Developers Association (SHDA).

In a statement, Romeo Thaddeus Liamzon Jr., BATA and PCCS chairman, said that the commitment of funds both for housing subdivision development and housing finance, will serve as a critical planning tool for housing producers in attaining their production targets for the year.

Available housing starts could be turned to completed units, which in turn could be easily sold, with the assurance of funds for homebuyers’ finance. Moreover, existing unsold inventories of completed units could also be disposed to a pre-qualified market of homebuyers, once funding commitments for individual housing loans are firmed up.

Given that the government started to pave the way for a more conducive regulatory environment for housing production through the recently-issued Executive Order (EO) 45, dramatically cutting the permit issuance process to three months for a housing project development to start, the funding allocations from home financing institutions should follow, to sustain the production and buyers acquisition of housing units, he cited.

On the other hand, while housing producers share the banks’ concern arising from their high level of non-performing loans as a dampener to lending, the government should also be able to address said concern through the further strengthening not only for its loan guarantee capability, but also of the capacity to service guarantee calls on loans which could turn sour, Liamzon added.