Source: FBC gives out $37m in mortgages – DailyNews Live
BUSINESS WRITER 7 March 2017
HARARE – FBC Building Society has spent over $37 million in mortgage loans
to fund its housing projects across the country.
The building society’s chairperson Benjamin Kumalo, on Friday said the
financial institution has delivered more than 900 housing units into the
property market since 2009.
“In 2016, the building society provided approximately $6 million in
mortgages,” he said, adding that his company has set aside $10 million
towards mortgage financing for this year aimed at reducing the country’s
1,2 million housing backlog.
This comes as the property developer is currently selling state-of-the-art
medium density cluster homes under the Masotsha Ndlovu project in
Waterfalls.
“We have several projects lined up for the year 2017. The building society
will develop three-bedroomed upmarket duplex apartments in Mount Pleasant
and Greendale.
“We will also construct two-bedroomed garden flats in Avondale,” Kumalo
added.
This comes as the building society recently said it was in the market
looking for land to replenish its depleted land bank with a special bias
toward high density developments.
FBC Holdings chief executive John Mushayavanhu in November last year noted
that the group’s building society – which had traditionally targeted
middle-to-high income residential developments – wanted to venture into
high density projects in light of the country’s economic challenges.
“… that is our land bank and as you can see it is depleting we now are
aggressively in the market looking for land and this time now we are also
looking for high density land because we want to do low income houses,” he
said, at a briefing of the group’s first half performance.
FBC building society’s land bank is made up of 9,6 acres of residential
stands in Glen Lorne, 1,1364 hectares which has been converted into 48
duplex units in Mt Pleasant’s St Kilda Road and a 7,336 square meter
residential stand now occupied by 15 cluster units all in the capital.
Mushayavanhu said the group, which has 10 residential development
projects, was driving a high density strategy to match the tough economic
environment which has seen tight liquidity and low disposable incomes
prevailing in the property market.
To date, all of the 8 Phillips Road Belgravia 15 units have been sold with
construction still in progress at the group’s Greendale Rossal project
while 20 out of the 24 units have been snapped off the market.
In the first half, the building society recorded a decrease in property
sales to $3,2 million from $3,3 million mainly due to tax adjustments on
its housing projects.
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