The Federal Housing Authority Mortgage Bank says it has disbursed N10.6bn national housing funds loans to 962 citizens.

The Managing Director of the Bank, Hayatudeen Awwal, revealed this during the handover ceremony of houses to Batch 1041 beneficiaries of the NHF loans, most of whom are doctors, recently in Abuja.

He said, “This event is to celebrate successful processing, disbursement and eventually handing over of keys and possession of houses to successful beneficiaries most of whom are medical practitioners and doctors.

“Today, FHA mortgage bank is proud to mention that we have so far accessed these mortgage loans to the tune of N10.6bn on behalf of 962 Nigerians and the houses cut across all strata of citizens. These houses are in Abuja, Lagos, Akwa Ibom, Imo, Enugu, Plateau, Kaduna, Kano, Sokoto and Zamfara States. All of these are fully built houses and people are staying there currently.

Hayatudeen stated that the agency had created over 200 jobs using the housing index, noting that “Through this, we are employing the entire value chain, enabling employment, income and industrialisation, fulfilling President Bola Tinubu’s vision of delivering affordable housing for Nigerians”.

Speaking during the event, FHA’s Managing Director, Senator Gbenga Ashafa, said that mortgage facilities remained a viable solution to help more Nigerians own a home as opposed to the cash and carry model, which had encouraged corruption and induced hardship on Nigerians.

“FHA mortgage bank, over these years, has amassed a pool of over 40,000 profiled off-takers with whom it is doing business with it, and has also been able to build robust partnerships with both public and private sectors, aside demonstrating strength in retail banking.”

He further advised the beneficiaries to commence the repayment process.

Ashafa added, “The national housing fund is not a national cake and we would appreciate that once you move into your houses, you make your contributions as well as the repayment so that other people can benefit because it is a revolving table.”

Responding on behalf of the beneficiaries, the former Vice President of the Nigerian Association of Resident Doctors, Dr Adejo Arome, thanked officials of FMBN and FHA for making homeownership accessible for doctors.

He claimed that the prevalent issue of brain drain and recurring strike action would be solved if more doctors were assisted to own a home.