Although Nigeria is at the moment faced with economic challenges and has been unable to meet housing needs of its teeming population, experts believe that the country could still overcome weather the storm by making frantic efforts to ensure that the right policy was put in place given the public perception that Nigerias housing problem was derived from a historical lack of focus on housing development.Amid sundry problems of housing that defied solutions propounded by successive governments in the country, wrong housing policy remained one of the constraints that has slowed down investments and hampered mass delivery of housing units in the country.It is against this backdrop that observers feel that novel innovations being propounded by the present administration could bridge the nations yawning housing deficit, while creating stable and healthy communities.Unveiling the road map to the federal governments housing programme at the 1st City People Real Estate, and Housing Lecture held recently in Lagos, the minister of power, works and housing, Mr Babatunde Fashola, said it was aimed at evolving a nationally- acceptable design that reflects diversity of culture and weather in the country while targeting the low and medium income earners.According to the minister, the process also involves standardising fittings towards reenergising local supply chain and economic diversification through small and medium businesses adding that this would lead to reduction in delivery time from the estimated 18 months to about six months for a standard flat.Noting that the deficiency in housing was largely due to the fact that the cost of building was high leading to high cost of both purchase and rent, Fashola said the present road map targets the low and medium income earners who are first time home owners.The minister said aside certifying and accrediting developers from the private sector, the road map was aimed at proving the workability and national acceptability of the new concept which, according to him, would be supported through governments funding in the short term.Describing 100 per cent home ownership by the population of any country as utopian, Fashola declared, The truth, which we must accept, is that 100 per cent home ownership is an ideal, but the reality is that, best practices in places like the UK and Singapore are stories of a mixture of ownership and rental.Success is defined and measured by the increasing number of tenants who become owners and not by the attainment of 100 per cent home ownership because owners today may become tenants tomorrow if they fall on hard economic times, just as tenants today may become owners in a season of prosperity, he said.The minister, who said his thoughts were directed on how to gradually and consistently increase the number of tenants who become owners, with a focus on first-time owners, said that the only way to achieve the thought was through mortgage, adding that the present system whereby people who earn their salary monthly were made to pay rent in advance was abnormal.It reinforces the need for a credit system in our real estate sector, where payments for rent are matched not only to the quantum but also the timing of income, he said adding that people who got paid weekly, monthly or yearly, should pay their rent weekly, monthly or yearly.According to him, aside relieving a lot of pressure on low income earners, it would allow increased occupancy of many flats that are now empty across the country because people could not pay multiple year advance rent from weekly or monthly incomes received in arrears.Reinforcing the need for mortgage financing as a means to increasing the rate of home ownership in the country, Fashola added that it would both reduce the frustrations of landlords who depend on their houses for income and who are saddled with defaulting tenants on one hand, and the trauma of families with children who are unsure when they would be thrown out on the other hand.Unfolding the concept, the minister, who announced the conclusion of the nationally- acceptable designs that respond to and accommodate the nations diversity said the ministry was able to reduce the myriads of designs from across the country to 21 from which it worked down to 12 and finally to six different designs.He gave the summary of the designs to include 1,2 and 3 bedroom bungalows, with court yards, that respond to the climate situation and cultural leanings of the north, to be built in states in the north-east, north- west and north-central parts of Nigeria and blocks of 16 and 24 flats of 1,2 and 3 bedrooms and bungalows of 1 and 2 bedrooms to be built in the south-south, south-east and south-west of Nigeria and the FCT.
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