LagosHOMS plans rent-to-own scheme, creates 193 jobs for project firms 

The Lagos State Home-Ownership Mortgage Scheme (LagosHOMS) is planning a special homeownership scheme known as ‘rent-to-own housing scheme’ which targets people who cannot afford a mortgage now but if given more time would be able to.

Beneficiaries of this new initiative are expected to pay rent for a period after which they are invited to take an offer to buy the houses. During that period, the scheme would have saved some of their rent for them as their equity to pay for mortgage and from there they migrate to become mortgage holders.

Babatunde Fashola, the Lagos State governor, who disclosed this plan at the fifth monthly draw for applicants to the LagosHOMS houses, stated that the rent-to-own scheme was looking at teachers and junior public servants who cannot, at this point, keep a mortgage because they have not worked for that long to acquire the kind of savings that is necessary. 

“We have run the mortgage scheme for some time and we have seen that there are some people who cannot yet afford a mortgage but if we give them more time, we think they can. So, we are opening the door of accessibility further by starting  this new scheme which we think will bring them in to benefit”, the governor said.

The draw produced 102 new homeowners, bringing the number of successful applicants to the scheme to well over 200 and, according to the governor, the objectives which the scheme was set out to achieve were being met including touching the lives of those who need the homes.

 “This housing project has many objectives.  It must touch those who need homes and there is a broad spectrum of them – vulnerable people, young people who are just starting out in their career, who are not yet married and are looking for a place to lay their heads. It is also for people who have worked for some time who wish to own their own property”, he said.

Beyond this, the governor noted, the scheme has also achieved the objective of providing jobs for thousands of people, pointing out that government has expanded the scheme to more places as a result of which many more people have been given the opportunity to get jobs and earn a living.

Chuka Uroko