MINISTER of Finance Colm Imbert says that $100 million will be allocated for the Housing and Village Improvement Programme.
Delivering the 2023/2024 Budget in the Lower House on Monday, he said, “The Housing and Village Improvement Programme has completed 468 units and will soon commence construction of an additional 275 units.
“Therefore, I propose to allocate $100 million in 2024 for ongoing and new projects under the Housing and Village Improvement Programme. We are targeting 26 areas throughout the country.
“This allocation will allow the completion of the construction of over 600 HVIP units in 2024, improving the accommodation of thousands of persons at the lowest end of the income scale.”
He said the Land Settlement Agency and the Trinidad and Tobago Mortgage Finance Company Limited will soon be merged with the Home Mortgage Bank to become the Trinidad and Tobago Mortgage Bank.
Imbert said the housing stock was being expanded and strengthened through State programmes and its affiliated agencies.
He said, “We are continuing to fund home improvement and construction subsidies to improve the liveability of low-income households.”
Imbert said 1,319 low-income households benefitted from these subsidies from June 2020 to June 2023 and 2,121 applications are now being processed.
He said, “We have allocated through the Housing Development Corporation 2,580 units during the period 2019-2023; so far in 2023, we have delivered 469 units.
“We have under construction 1,204 units in multiple sites under the Financed Project Programme of the Housing Development Corporation.
“We intend to begin construction at four additional sites at a cost of $357 million, yielding 430 units at Almond Drive, Citrus Grove, Caura Royal Road and Exchange, Couva.”
Imbert said 600 housing units were being built under the Design-BuildFinance-Programme utilising public-private partnerships.
He said, “We have completed 128 units on Malabar, Riverside East and Riverside South, San Fernando.
“In the upcoming year, we are building 88 units; and We are utilizing small and medium contractors under our Small and Medium Contractors Initiative to construct 110 housing units; 193 units have been delivered since policy inception, with 57 units in 2023.”
Imbert said, “We are disbursing a $1.5 billion government-guaranteed loan raised in 2023 in tranches to reduce the outstanding debt to housing contractors and to assist with new and stalled construction projects.
“We have in stock 1,692 unfinished units, and we envisage that we will spend approximately $350 million on ongoing and stalled legacy projects.”
