We Can’t Finance Homes That Low-income Earners Can’t Afford, FHF Reiterates
• Urges Developers to Key into Family Homes Funds’ Social Housing Scheme
The Family Homes Funds (FHF) has reiterated its commitment towards provision of affordable housing in the country.
It also noted that it would not finance any housing project that low-income citizens can’t afford.
These were made known by the managing director of the FHF, Mr. Femi Adewole during a roundtable discussion forum with private sector developers in Abuja on Tuesday.
According to him, the programme is held quarterly to build partnerships and capacity with the private development market, aimed at meeting the housing needs of Nigerians on low-income.
He said the organization has set out itself to be financially sustainable with efficient operations while also running a strong corporate governance to gain necessary confidence in potential investors as a well-run organization, even as not being profit maximizing.
“I think we have broadly achieved that. Over the last 24-months, we were the first organization to issue a corporate bond in the capital market for affordable housing, a SUKUK bond of 30billion naira; we also attracted financing from the African Development Bank for 60million Dollars; and we are having very advanced discussions with a number of investors and lenders, which we’ll ensure that in the foreseeable future, Family Homes Funds (FHF) has access to capital in the sustainable way to support housing for Nigerians”, he added.
Responding to the need for developers to insure building projects, Adewole said that as part of the FHF financing agreement, there are three stages of insurance that developers are required to pass.
“First, their buildings must be insured during construction, on completion and as part of post-sales efforts, ensure that buyers as a condition of their mortgage also insure the building”, he said.
Speaking on the process involved in accessing FHF housing loan, the head of affordable homes development, Family Homes Funds, Mr. Funsho Gbodi noted that every applicant must go through formal application and preliminary assessment, loan application review, formal negotiation & acceptance of indication term sheet, among others.
Gbodi added that every project cycle as approved by FHF should not exceed 36months, noting that the lending limit for public sector project is N4 billion while that of private sector is N2 billion.
Participants were also taken through a well detailed analysis of documents required to access FHF’s housing funds, ranging from technical documents to land documents, financial projections, and the profile of their organizations.
On Partnership, the Chief Housing Investment Officer (CHIO) of Family Homes Funds, Mr. Sani Yakubu said that FHF is in talks with relevant development partners for effective facilitation of land, ensuring capacity to build, as well as delivering quality projects in line with FHF target price indicators.
