Egypt braces for Biggest Budget for Housing Sector

Egypt is preparing for the biggest budget in the history of the housing sector, ranging between 14-15 billion Egyptian pounds (US$1.8-2 billion), the country’s minister of housing announced Saturday.

Egypt’s Minister of Housing, Moustafa Madbouly revealed that his ministry is currently working on the first budget for the Social Housing Finance Fund, to be later submitted for approval to the fund’s board in the coming days.

The fund’s proposed budget is set to be endorsed at value of 14-15 billion pounds in addition to two billion pounds allocated from the state’s budget, he noted.

The Egyptian minister further told reporters on Saturday that his ministry is making progress towards achieving social justice, through carrying out large number of projects for low to middle income citizens, notably the “one million homes”.

The fund will resume the implementation of the “one million homes” project, to ease burden on the state’s budget, Madbouly noted.

“The fund’s budget relies on revenues worth 13 billion pounds, generated from units put for sale to citizens, in addition to the first payment worth 1 billion pounds of World Bank’s loan.” Khaled Abbas – housing minister aide for technical affairs and the fund’s executive manager stated.

The project’s expenses are at value of 15 billion pounds approximately, including 100.000 under-construction units worth 4 billion pounds in addition to the launch of 160.000 units worth 11 billion pounds, Abbas added.

“It is the biggest budget in the Egyptian Housing’s history.” Abbas said

Furthermore, Abbas expected that the total number of units to be completed during the current fiscal year 2014-2015 would reach 171.398 units, saying the units being implemented in the new cities would be self-financed by the New Urban Communities Authority (NUCA).

NUCA has executed so far 69.548 units, and is currently implementing 103.095 units in two phases throughout the country’s governorates, in addition to 50.016 units as part of the UAE grant, and 1.356 thousand units finances by the Housing fund.

The Social Housing Finance Fund is presided by the country’s housing minister, Moustafa Madbouly, with board members including; finance minister Hany Qadry, minister of international cooperation, Nagla Al Ahwany, minister of local development Adel Labib, social solidarity minister Ghada waly, and Armed forced Engineering Authority chairman’s assistant Ibrahim El Sorogy.