“The largest challenge that we face, from my perspective, is the ability to continue moving forward so the agency will have a single mission: that is, to provide decent, safe and affordable housing” –Alphonso Jackson.
By Akhigbe Dominic.M.
MON, JANUARY 30 2017-Just like Alphonsos R. Jackson, the 13th United States Secretary of Housing & Urban Development rightly pointed out in his famous quote above, emphasis has always been on Affordable Housing. In 2004 when he was appointed HUB by the then President, George W. Bush, he had a definite mandate; to herald policies that would promote and sustain the policy of safe, durable and affordable Housing for Americans. This he pursued with every patriotic sense of vigor and his outstanding people-oriented policies were sustained by his successors like Mel Martinez, Steve Preston and all others that were to follow. Today, safe and affordable housing is no more a teething challenge to Americans and residents of the United States of America.
Safe, affordable and sustainable housing schemes world over are a function of deliberate sustainable policies. It is not an accident. It is not a guess work and it is not an adhoc policy since the need for housing is endemic and continually subsisting. The Housing policy, like any other must be “a plan of action, a statement of aims and ideas or a statement of intent made to guide activities in the Housing endeavor. The major thrust of housing policy is to achieve some housing goals which universally manifest as to adequately house everybody in a given country, in a good housing located in a good environment and at an affordable cost.”-Agboola, 1998. From the foregoing, Housing policies must emphasis affordability, safety, accessibility and must provide the needed comfort for the occupiers.
Nigeria as a country has made some definite effort in deliberate housing policies mostly from the days of the Obasanjo regime. A new policy frame work which came in as draft policy originated in 2004. This was subjected to extensive robust evaluation by all the stake holders including the 36 states of Nigeria. A new housing policy was finally born for the country in 2006. This was the final product of a 15-man committee set up by the then government of General Olusegun Obasanjo from 2001 to martial out a workable housing policy that was actually expected to tackle the perennial housing challenge to Nigerians and gradually disengage the government from a supplier status to a policy-setter status and significantly encourage privately developed housing provision. In 2006, a new housing policy was published with fundamental applaudable changes made from the 1991 policy. Under the new policy, housing amortization was increased from 25 years to 30 years with a reduced interest rate from 9 percent to 6 percent for the National Housing Funds contributors and the Private Mortgage Institutions scaled down from 5 percent to 4 percent.
This was a definite effort to ensure that quality and durable housing were made affordable to Nigerians from all walks of life without the initial impediments that were inherent in the earlier housing policies. Since these changes, attempted to accentuate hosing delivery to Nigerians were made statutory, one would have expected that we would have more Nigerians accessing housing provisions through the PMIs who are partners in this task. A survey will amazingly shock one of the displayed ignorance to the availability of these various windows of house ownership schemes.
I had a tour of the various Estates ran by a private developer who has bill boards strategically located in choice places all over Lagos and Ogun States and has penetrated almost every media opportunity to market his lands and housing units. I asked him how he expected an average Nigerian to raise close to ten million naira cash for his advertised 2-bedrooms semi detached bungalows in the suburb of Ogun State. He promptly retorted that had very convenient options for the ordinary Nigerian who can not afford the one-pay-off offer of the close to ten million naira. I eagerly asked him, ‘how flexible is this option?’ He cleared his throat and said, “As long as 5-year period to pay!” To me, this certainly is not for the ordinary Nigerian. I told him the ordinary Nigerian is not the one that has capacity to pay two million naira in a year. I told him the ordinary Nigerian requires something more flexible and more affordable, a housing delivery package that will not ordinarily take the sleep away from him. He asked me cautiously; ‘what is the nature of this your affordable package for the Ordinary Nigerian?’ I told him something in the region of three hundred thousand naira a year or a gestation of at least 15 years. He laughed sarcastically and said, ‘not in Nigeria; which bank will fund that?’
From this conversation, it became obvious that my host either has no idea of the existence of the 2006 housing policy, or chose to ignore the key importance of the NHF and the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria. This truly has been the bane of affordable housing delivery using these windows of opportunities. If a developer of such status is not aware he can get a facility for as low as 4 percent to deliver housing solutions for a gestation period of up to 30 years, how then do we blame the ordinary Nigerian who still daily falls into the trap of the ‘omon onile’ among other dangers in a bid to securing a land to help realize the dream of a good hosing unit?
The institutions saddled with this responsibility have a lot to do in the area of awareness creation. There is need to aggressively sensitive Nigerians of these opportunities. Nigerians need to be informed. I asked a few folks in a Housing Conference organized by a major player in the Real Estate sub-sector who is a partner to The Federal Mortgage Bank what he was doing to inform Nigerians about the existence of his product; he said he was doing a lot. ‘For example, we have a lot of video clips of our estates and available housing units on YouTube’. The question is: how many ordinary Nigerians access the internet as a matter of necessity much more going to YouTube to search for videos that talk about affordable housing on Mortgage for them? That is tantamount to putting a round peg in a square hole. I told him without mincing word that such effort is not expected to yield any meaningful result. There are far more accessible media options through which the deserving public can be reach with a product that is so dear to their hearts than such elitism medium.
The Mortgage facility is readily available through the private developers and the PMIs in partnership. My interaction with some of the private developers has aptly revealed that they have unimpaired capacity to meet with the housing demands of Nigerians who approach them for such. A major player actually confided in me that his company has fully finished, ready-to-move in housing units waiting for subscribers. From the 2006 Housing policy, almost every Nigerian that engages in any form of economic activity and contributes to the National Housing Funds is sufficiently qualified to apply. Those requirements that seem to them as insurmountable are not as difficult as they seem. The role of the Private developers in partnership with the PMIs and the Federal Mortgage bank of Nigeria is to assist willing subscribers to access these facilities.
As Professor Ahonsi Simeon, a Professor of Housing & Urban Development and the CEO of one of the Private Developers companies told me in a chat with him, ‘Nigerians should not wait to buy; they should buy to wait. House is a fixed asset that remains where it is forever. No matter how remotely positioned the house is today, someday soon, urbanization will catch up with it. It is therefore not a wise decision to insist in crowded unhealthy habitations in the present day urban centers when they can avail themselves great living environments just minutes drive away from the so-called urban centers. People should begin to divest into proximate suburbs now, failure to do that will come up with huge regrets in not too distant future’. He said about four years ago, a plot of land was offered to him for less than two million naira somewhere in OPIC, Isheri North, Ogun state. He didn’t see why he should sink such huge sum in a land that would probably not realize value in the foreseeable future. He declined the offer. Today, his OPIC City office is on the same plot of land as a yearly tenant at over a million naira annually. So, in real Estate, you don’t market. Just lay the facts bare. In a few months or years, those facts will become fully illuminated. It is therefore a very unwise decision to play the Ostrich game even if the players are not doing enough to inform Nigerians of the accessibility and availability of safe, affordable housing through Mortgage that could spread for up to 30 years at just 6 percent.
Akhigbe Dominic.M. Esq., /Property Law Expert/CEO, H.I.E Properties & Homes Ltd/SENIOR STRATEGIC PARTNER, PropertyLogic Incorporated/Seasoned Business Coach/Columnist of The BusinessDay/Contributing Editor, govandbusinessjournal.com.ng
