On a monthly basis, home ownership is trickling down to some Lagos State residents who ordinarily would not have been able to own homes, especially at the time, price and manner houses are offered to them as their own for life.

Lagos is a city, Africa’s most populous and cosmopolitan city where owning a home has never been a feeble task given its estimated population of about 18 million people scrambling for an estimated two million habitable housing units.

Unconfirmed report says that about two million of Nigeria’s 16 million housing units deficit are in Lagos—a  situation that has been worsened by the preference by housing developers to restrict their developments in the high-end market, while low-income houses are disappearing by the day.

As an interventionist strategy to salvage this situation, the state government launched the Lagos Home Ownership Mortgage Scheme (HOMS) which is the magic wand now availing first-time home  buyers opportunity to own homes through a monthly  draw  that has so far produced 235 (house) winners.

The draw which was first held on March 4 this year, was envisaged to produce 200 home owners monthly, but in the last four months it has been able to produce 235 which, in the opinion of observers, is quite commendable.

Babatunde Fashola, the state governor, noted at the June and fourth draw, which produced 92 first-time homeowners, that it had not been an easy task to deliver 200 housing units monthly, recalling  that the draw produced 31, 36 and 76 homeowners in March, April and May respectively.

This, he said, affirmed that the scheme was getting better, adding, “we know it’s a journey and we are ready to go all the distance.”

Bosun Jeje, the state’s commissioner for housing, had earlier at a press briefing said the Fashola administration would do its best to deliver as many units as possible through the mortgage scheme, revealing that about 5,626 housing units were undergoing construction across 20 sites within the state, and assured that the state would not run out of supply in the near future.

The governor charged contractors handling  various housing projects for the scheme to increase their speed by, if need be, employing more workers, adding that the simultaneous construction of several housing schemes in the state should be a catalyst to create employment opportunities.

“If it’s necessary to get more shifts and more hands on deck at various sites to speed up the delivery process, then the unemployment market should be explored, because I don’t see how we can comfortably say there are no job opportunities and continue to work one shift on construction sites. We should be working two shifts of eight hours each at sites to enable us reduce construction time without compromising quality and the safety of workers at construction sites,” he said.

A close look at the HOMS website showed that July edition of the draw is expected to offer more opportunities with the Sir Michael Otedola Estate, Epe, Ilupeju Scheme, Oba Adeboruwa Estate, Ikorodu, and  Shogunro Scheme I and II set to receive new homeowners.

2014-06-10