“The REDF has waived loans of the citizens of different cities and villages, which come as a big relief for the kith and kin in the families,” said Hassan bin Mohammed Al-Attas, the fund’s acting director general, while giving details Saturday of REDF’s operations. “Those who died after Sept. 11, 2007 will be covered by the loan waiver scheme only if they had been paying the loans’ installments regularly.”
He also said the government had earmarked SR1.5 billion in home-building and home-buying loans.
“The REDF will provide loans to Saudi citizens to build 6,000 housing units throughout the Kingdom,” said an REDF statement.
It said that the housing loan services offered by the REDF has benefited people in 3,976 towns and villages across the Kingdom.
The REDF, which has simplified its lending conditions, has distributed 21,211 government-built houses. The move is significant in view of the growing housing requirement of the citizens in the country. A recent government study by Amir Al-Alwan, an expert in urban planning, found that home ownership among Saudi public sector employees is about 39 percent. The public sector is the largest employer of Saudis.
The study revealed that the Kingdom suffers from a growing housing shortage, and it will need billions of riyals in the next 10 years to meet demand estimated to be around 200,000 units per year, mostly for middle-class and limited-income families.
Since the beginning of its operations in 1974, the REDF has advanced 411,711 personal loans worth billions of dollars, leading to the building of 489,404 housing quarters.
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