THE national government is planning to grant incentives to developers to make home ownership accessible to more Filipinos while addressing the country’s housing backlog, according to officials of the Department of Human Settlements and Urban Development (DHSUD).
Angelito F. Aguila, officer-in-charge director for the Real Estate Development and Regulation Bureau of the DHSUD, said the agency is already in talks with the Board of Investments (BOI) to include rental housing in the Strategic Investment Priorities Plan entitling developers to incentives.
According to Aguila, the government can also allow rental housing as compliance by developers to a regulation mandating them to allocate a portion of their project portfolio to socialized housing.
“One way of making land available for housing is to unlock idle government land,” he said. “We hear developers saying there is not enough land. The government has plenty of idle and readily available land.”
Aguila said these idle lands can be used by developers to build rental properties to increase housing production for the informal sectors and even for the private sector or in partnership.
He said increasing housing production cannot be achieved with only the “for sale” scheme, particularly for socialized and economical housing.
“We have to come up with other modes of secured housing. We can grant usufruct for housing for those who are not yet ready for homeownership in terms of affordability and preference …by providing temporary rental housing,” Aguila said.
“Rental housing is being considered as an option for those who cannot afford homeownership right away and will form part of the country’s 20-year housing roadmap. If we really have to increase our housing production, we have to make our land accessible and utilizable,” he added.
Subdivision and Housing Developers Association (SHDA) National President May P. Rodriguez concurs with Aguila expressing the private sector’s openness to undertake this scheme in partnership with local government units (LGUs).
Rodriguez said these projects can cater to the needs of informal settler families and government employees. She added there is a market for rental properties, especially from the working population and even students who live in the province.
In a recent forum, Rodriguez said the SHDA expects the Philippine housing industry to grow this year as developers clear up the backlog that built up during the pandemic.
“In 2020, all private developers experienced a downward trend. Sales were not as good, and collections were a challenge. We understand some of our buyers lost their jobs or shifted their priorities. Fortunately, towards the end of 2020 and 2021, many developers were able to recover, but not yet to pre-pandemic levels,” Rodriguez said.
“Private developers were able to accomplish 50 to 70 percent of what they were doing pre-pandemic, and I think the outlook is that it will continue to improve in 2022,” she added.
Earlier, the DHSUD said the housing sector’s accomplishments over the past five years, wherein it posted the best performance in terms of annual housing production and financing—with an average of 195,687 per year which is the highest among the previous six administrations since 1975.
DHSUD Secretary Eduardo D. Del Rosario said that the housing sector produced and financed more than 1.07 million housing units between the years 2016 to 2021.
Hence, Del Rosario expressed optimism that the DHSUD and key shelter agencies would achieve more than 100 percent of the target under the Philippine Development Plan set by the National Economic Development Authority by the end of the year.