66, 000 apply for FG's 10000 housing units

Nigerians over subscribed for the 10,000 mortgages put on offer by the Federal Government, with 66,402 Nigerians expressing interests in the scheme.

The Coordinating Minister for the Economy and Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, disclosed this at a briefing in Abuja, yesterday.

Her words, “as at Friday the 5th of September, 2014, we had received 66,402 valid applications. That was the closing date of the applications for the first phase, as we earlier announced.

“That is more than six times oversubscription to our initial 10,000 pilot phase 1. I want to say that we are extremely pleased with this outcome.”

Rather than selecting only 10, 000 successful applications as initially planned, she said that all applications would be processed by the 21 oragnisations participating in the initiative and that all those pre-qualified would benefit from the scheme.

The minister said an analysis of the applications showed while 51 per cent of all the applicants preferred to live in Abuja, 18 per cent wanted Lagos.

According to her, “this shows that almost 70 per cent of applicants want to live in Nigeria’s capital city, Abuja, and the largest commercial city, Lagos. This is a strong belief in the unity of Nigeria, contrary to what some people are saying about the unity of the nation.”

Dr. Okonjo-Iweala said that further analysis of the applications received from all the 36 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory showed that about 60 per cent of applicants were between the ages of 31 and 40, while 15 per cent were in the 21-30 year bracket.

According to her, 92 per cent of applicants were in stable employed positions, with only 8 per cent self-employed.

She said that President Goodluck Jonathan was very keen on the success of the initiative and has been asking for updates which has put all stakeholders on their toes with a view to delivering on the president’s promises.

“Mr. president is monitoring this process and is asking questions and we have to be on our toes”, she said, adding the initiative would change the face of mortgage industry in the nation to the advantage of Nigerians.

The minister said that the 17 Primary Mortgage Institutions and the four banks participating in the scheme would provide low-interest, long-term mortgages of between 10 to 20 years.

She explained that the scheme would be flexible enough for beneficiaries to choose their own houses and then only collect the facilities from the PMIs to buy.

The Chief Executive Officer of the Nigeria Mortgage Refinance Corporation, Mr. Sunnie Ayere assured that his organisation was set for the implementation of the scheme.