National Pension Commission (PenCom) has obtained the list of approved mortgage banks from the Central Bank of Nigeria to participate in closing the wide gap in residential mortgage in Nigeria for the eligible contributors in the 9.4 million contributory pension scheme.
PenCom in the list despatched today contained 34 mortgage banks spread across the current listed states of the federation with Lagos topping with 19, following is Abuja with 7 and 2 for Akwa Ibom and other states that made the entry one each.
The mortgage firms were divided into two: national with minimum capital requirement of N5bn and state with N2.5bn minimum capital. In all there are 13 categorised under national while the remaining 21 are in state bracket.
Meanwhile the Commission has assured Nigerians who are on the edge to begin the process that the residential mortgage policy would work. This assurance was giving on behalf of the Director General, Aisha Dahir-Umar by Ehimeme Ohioma a Director at a media parley hosted by Pension Operators of Nigeria PenOp in Lagos for pension journalists.
Ohioma said said the soon to commence policy need the support of all eligible contributors and stakeholders in the approving chain for the good of the country.
He said the pension industry is strong and would partner with other stakeholders to make it work. At the parley PenCom officials said the initial cut off for eligible contributors was 10 years but has now been reduced to five years. With the reduction of years for eligible contributors, PenCom officials said 50% of current contributors could apply to access 25% of the RSA funds for residential mortgage.
