HOMEBUILDER Habitat for Humanity continues to help curb the housing backlog in the country, as it aims to build around 800,000 dwelling units in the next five years.
Habitat for Humanity Philippines CEO and Managing Director Charlito S. Ayco told the BusinessMirror that this is in line with their 2020 goal to help address at least 20 percent of the housing backlog, which is currently pegged at 4 million.
He pointed out that four of 10 Filipino families today do not own their house and do not enjoy security of land tenure. The same ratio applies to those who live in urban slum areas, he added.
“Every year, on average, new housing needs reach 300,000 plus. The annual output is only like 200,000 and less. So the backlog piles up,” Ayco said.
Citing the government-accepted Housing Road Map of the Philippines proposal from the Subdivision and Housing Developers Association Inc., he noted that around 1 million housing units must be built between 2014 and 2016, and the next 2 million should be done by 2020.
Given such, however, he raised concern on the market’s buying capability based on the University of Asia and the Pacific’s survey, showing that over 800,000 families cannot afford to buy a house even if it is priced at P365,000.
“Our vision for the Philippines is total eradication of lack of housing, and that all Filipinos must live in a decent house,” he said.
“So, for Habitat, what we do is we bring people together to build homes and communities. The home is just an entry point. What we would like to do is that the people living in that community will really have a very active community, and, ultimately, as a Christian organization, we want to bring hope to the people,” he added.
To date, the nonprofit housing organization has mobilized over 130,000 volunteers. It, likewise, has reached out to around 102,000 families.
Ayco urged the public to continue supporting their cause of helping achieve the national goal of reducing the total dwelling deficit in the country by 20 percent in the year 2020.
Approximately, he said that they need around P320 billion if each of the 800,000 dwelling units they seek to build costs P400,000.
“That falls at the range of socialized house and lot costing P450,000 and below,” he said. “Practically, the socialized sector is an abandoned sector. Why is that? Because the market is not supplying it now. And that is where we want to be engaged with.”
Seeing that the housing backlog could increase to 6.5 million by 2030 without drastic changes achieved to address such a perennial problem, Ayco also called for cooperation among other similar organizations.
“I think what Habitat, and other organizations like us, can do is to try to influence policy on housing provision in the country,” he stressed. “We have to increase the awareness of people that this housing is really a societal problem, and that it can be solved.”