Dayo ayeyemi Mortgage
N100 billion ($ 256.95 million) has been proposed as budget for the implementation of MIDF
The Nigerian Mortgage Refinance Company (NMRC) has recommended that the Nigerian Mortgage Guarantee Company (NMGC) should be fully implemented within 12 months, precisely by mid- 2021.
Pushing for this, the Managing Director of NMRC, Mr. Kehinde Ogundimu, said this had become imperative in the context of COVID-19 and the CBN’s planned funding intervention for housing. According to the latest report from Africa Union for Housing Finance (AUHF) on “Nigeria housing sector responses to COVID-19,” the proposed creation of the Mortgage Interest Draw Back Fund (MIDF) and NMGC would be useful in a COVID-19 economic context.
The report stated that NMRC had provided commentary on the NMGC and investment for the accelerated implementation of the MIDF. This, the report from AUHF said, included a proposed budget of N100 billion ($256.95 million) for the implementation of the MIDF and the disbursement of the funds to be processed using NMRC’s Mortgage Market System.
“Finally, the NMRC recommend that the NMGC should be fully implemented within 12 months – that is by mid- 2021,” the report read. The NMGC is a public private partnership designed to improve access to affordable housing finance in the country and currently under incubation with equity investment and infrastructure support from NMRC.
The MIDF was approved for establishment in 2018 as an intervention fund to catalyse and deepen the mortgage and housing finance market by the CBN’s Committee of Governors (COG).
According to the latest AUHF report, CBN, as the apex bank of Nigeria, would need to encourage commercial banks to invest and participate in the implementation of both the Fund and the partnership.
It said that CBN was also engaging various housing stakeholders including the NMRC to provide commentary and suggestions for the practical implementation of the COVID-19 funding intervention for the housing and mortgage industry.
Apart from commentary on MIDF and NMGC, NMRC also suggested strategy for consideration by the CBN full implementation of the Electronic Mortgage Asset Registry System (EMARS) within 12 months.
The EMARS is an “integrated IT system linking the federal and states’ land and mortgage assets registries, to make mortgage transactions online, simplified and accessible by stakeholders and to track encumbered mortgage assets used as collateral.” It is an ongoing housing data development initiative by the NMRC with the support of the World Bank.
According to the report, NMRC suggested the use of the Global Standing Instruction (GSI) in case there is an overpayment (either by mistake or fraud) to any individual (developer) participating in the CBN’s primary housing COVID-19 intervention. “The GSI is an initiative of the CBN, which stops existing bad debtors planning to borrow extra money from other financial institutions,” it said.
The suggestion, the report said, was premised on the fact that the GSI is linked with the Bank Verification Number (BVN) and would assist with the CBN’s verification process of potential offtakers. “There is also NMRC’s Mortgage Market System (MMS) which is a proprietary mortgage underwriting and mortgage transactions processing system that is currently integrated with the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBSS)on Bank Verification Number.
“The NIBSS is a shared service infrastructure for facilitating inter-bank payments. NMRC suggests the use of the MMS for handling all housing-related transactions as part of the proposed housing intervention,” the report said.