Kecia Rust: Over 60,000 housing units built without subsidies in South Africa

South Africa (SA) is implementing housing finance mechanisms without government subsidies, Kecia Rust, the Executive Director and founder of the Center for Affordable Housing Finance in Africa (CAHF), said at WUF13 in Baku, Report informs.

According to her, affordable housing is often created without subsidies through the efforts of many small participants.

"When we think of scale, we think of large systems. But what we're really talking about is the massive impact of many small efforts coming together," Rust emphasized.

As an example, she cited TUHF, a South African lender in Johannesburg that provides mortgages to small homeowners for the purchase and renovation of apartments, which can then be sold or rented out.

"This financing mechanism helped provide over 60,000 housing units in South Africa without any construction subsidies. The only subsidy was the central government, through its National Housing Finance Corporation, providing subsidized capital to this lender," the expert said.