The Executive Director of Housing Development Advocacy Network (HDAN), Barrister Festus Adebayo, has admonished the government to make land provision less cumbersome for estate developers and urged the government to begin aggressive mass housing schemes if the perennial housing deficit in the country must be reduced.
In a programme on Africa Independent Television AIT on Sunday morning, monitored by Housing TV Africa, Adebayo urged governments at all levels to make land accessible to the people and provide low-interest-rate mortgages to the citizenry so that they can begin their journey to home ownership.
“Government should make land and mortgage affordable. A good mortgage does not go beyond one digit. Today in Nigeria, the only organization offering a single-digit interest rate is the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria FMBN which is 6%.
Adebayo decried the high interest on mortgages by Private Lenders and commercial banks as inimical to the growth of the sector calling for a reduction to make mortgages available to ordinary Nigerians.
“Nigerians cannot go to commercial banks to get loans to build their houses and the government must come in to address this critical issue.
To address the housing imbalance in the country, the housing expert advised Nigerians to reduce their penchant for imported building materials and focus more on using locally manufactured ones for housing construction, as this will reduce cost and increase the affordability ratio of housing in Nigeria.
Adebayo charged Developers and builders to engage professionals in their building projects and avoid cheap quacks that are not registered with professional bodies. “When you engage the services of the real professional who is trained for that profession if he does any shortcut, you can report him to his professional body, and he will be sanctioned. If you think education is expensive, then give ignorance a trial. He said.
On the deployment of technology in solving the housing debacle in Nigeria, the seasoned real estate expert opined that the new era of property tech within the housing sector will further revolutionize the sector calling on professionals to constantly upgrade their skills so as not to remain redundant in the industry.
“We are in the era of prop-tech where construction sites are now being monitored and work done evaluated virtually without visiting the site physically. Virtual tours are now the new normal, and developers can now buy a lot of things online without traveling long grueling hours.
When asked how to address the empty houses in Abuja. Adebayo urged the government to prioritize mass housing for the poor, the average workers, and journalists.
“The problem is government always builds houses for the rich. Housing must be provided to the people who really need them, the workers. I have heard Wike providing houses for the judges in Abuja, when is he going to provide for the journalists and Doctors? A visibly agitated Adebayo queried.
