The Federal Government says it will start charging owners of completed unoccupied houses triple ground rents instead of the single rate normally charged from three months after completion.
The Minister of Housing and Urban Development, Mr Ahmed Dangiwa said this in an interview with newsmen during his continuation to site visits of housing projects constructed by the government and its agencies on Friday in Abuja.
Recall that the projects are the Suleja (Dikko) Prototype, Public Private Partnerships Cooperative, Gwagwalada National Housing Programme and Guzape Federal Housing Authority (FHA)
also under PPP arrangement.
Dangiwa affirmed that the issue of completed unoccupied properties was prevalent in the FCT and some states of the federation while many citizens were in dare need of accommodation.
“What is important now is that we want to take stock of all those houses then we will interface with the owners and find out what they want.
“If they want to keep the houses unoccupied, the government will start charging them triple ground rent instead of a single ground rent that we charge.
“That will force them to either put it on rent at whatever amount or they sell them off. Because we cannot keep saying we have housing deficit, when we have a lot of empty houses that are completed and left unoccupied.
“We have charged the department of lands, urban and regional planning in our ministry to take stock of those estates to give the names of the proprietors or the owners of those estates.
“Any estate that stays more than three months unoccupied then we will start charging them triple ground rent this is what we intend to do,” he said.
On the supervision of projects across the country, the minister said all state controllers would be empowered and given the proper tools and equipment to carry out their functions effectively.
Vanguard
