{"id":320268,"date":"2017-05-18T09:05:41","date_gmt":"2017-05-18T09:05:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=320268"},"modified":"2017-05-18T09:05:41","modified_gmt":"2017-05-18T09:05:41","slug":"affordable-housing-a-mirage-for-most-ghanaians-greda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2017\/05\/affordable-housing-a-mirage-for-most-ghanaians-greda\/","title":{"rendered":"Affordable housing a mirage for most Ghanaians – GREDA"},"content":{"rendered":"
The Ghana Real Estate Developers Association (GREDA) says its analysis points to the fact that lower income earners within the country may never benefit from government\u2019s affordable housing project.<\/p>\n
According to GREDA, current conditions and systems prevailing within the country do not favour lower income earners who dream of owning a house.<\/p>\n
[contextly_sidebar id=”p30E3mrnAWgQjSrk85NWGv3qKMCMTAin”]At an affordable housing dialogue on Wednesday, the Executive Director for Ghana Real Estate Developers Association, Sammy Amegayibor also indicated that mortgage systems within the country are ineffective.<\/p>\n
“The systems that are in place today don\u2019t support that[affordable housing] arrangement and unless we work towards changing it, it will just be a mirage,\u201d he said to Citi News<\/strong>.<\/p>\n He explained that the issues holding potential homeowners back had to do with financing “and we don’t have very effective mortgage systems. The general earnings of Ghanaians are also questionable.\u201d<\/p>\n The average interest rate for mortgage loans among commercial banks stood at 33.8 percent in March 2017 and in\u00a0Mr. Amegayibor’s view, “if you look at public sector workers, the amount of money they qualify for in a mortgage is so small it cannot even buy them a house in the first place.\u201d<\/p>\n “If the government takes up certain aspects of the cost build up, then we can talk about bringing the price down but it is not possible now. That is the reality. That is the truth unless we change things and we don\u2019t have to shy away from it,\u201d he concluded.<\/p>\n