The Federal Housing Authority on Monday commenced the first phase of the construction of 300,000 mass housing projects for low income earners across the country.

It was gathered that the N200bn housing intervention fund that was recently approved by the Central Bank of Nigeria would be deployed for the construction of the homes.

The Managing Director, FHA, Senator Gbenga Ashafa, on Monday signed a Memorandum of Understanding on behalf of the government with Family Homes Funds Limited for the construction and delivery of 1,000 homes, being phase one of the 300,000-units social housing projects.

He told journalists in Abuja that some FHA directors on Monday visited the site where the first 1,000 houses would be built in Bwari, a satellite town in Abuja, adding that full construction would start in November.

Ashafa said, “The overall objective of the partnership being formalised at this ceremony is to commence the first phase of the delivery of 300,000 housing units which the President has promised Nigerians, particularly those at the lower end of the income ladder.

“The FHA is proud to be the first public agency to key into this vision with today’s signing of a partnership agreement with FHFL as we collaborate to deliver the first 1,000 housing units of the mass housing project.”

On the financial outlay that would be invested in the first phase of the project, the Managing Director, FHFL, Femi Adewole, said although this had not been determined, funding for the project would also come from the N200bn CBN mass housing intervention.

He said, “The FHA has perhaps more land for housing than anybody else in this country. The Family Homes Funds has a target to produce 300,000 homes for Nigerians who are on low income.

“And as you probably know, the Central Bank of Nigeria through the Ministry of Finance has made available an initial capital allocation of N200bn towards the execution of that programme.”

Adewole added, “What we are hoping to do is to deploy some of that capital into sites that are owned by the Federal Housing Authority to produce homes for Nigerians on very low income.

“And I want to say that those homes are homes that people can buy at N2m for the one bedrooms; N2.5m and N2.75m for the two bedrooms; and N3.25m and N3.5m for the three bedrooms.”

By Okechukwu Nnodim