Simelane says housing demand still outstrips supply as NHFC marks 30 years
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Human Settlements Minister Thembi Simelane says South Africa's housing backlog stands at about 2.6 million people, with demand for affordable housing continuing to outstrip supply, as the National Housing Finance Corporation marked its 30th anniversary.
Human Settlements Minister Thembi Simelane says South Africa's housing challenge remains significant, with demand for affordable housing continuing to outstrip supply. The country's housing backlog is estimated at about 2.6 million people in need of housing.
Simelane was speaking at the National Housing Finance Corporation's (NHFC) 30th anniversary summit at the Birchwood Hotel in Boksburg. She said decades of apartheid spatial planning had deliberately excluded millions of South Africans from property ownership, credit and the basic dignity of a secure home.
"The government of the day recognised a hard truth that the housing crisis could not be solved through public funding alone. We needed an institution capable of mobilising private capital, bridging the gap between what South Africans could afford and what traditional lenders would finance," she said. Simelane noted that the NHFC's 30th anniversary coincides with the 30th anniversary of the adoption of the Constitution, whose Section 26 enshrines the right to adequate housing.
Reflecting on the NHFC's record, she said more than R13 billion in housing finance had been facilitated and more than 800,000 households had been helped to access housing opportunities. More than 32,000 subsidy approvals have been made through the First Home Finance programme since 2019, with close to R2 billion disbursed and R10.9 billion in private-sector investment leveraged through the programme.
She said the First Home Finance programme serves the "gap market" — people earning between R3,501 and R22,000 a month who earn too much to qualify for a fully subsidised house but too little to secure a traditional bond — and that it had been expanded to rural areas, with traditional leaders thanked for their partnership.
Simelane said rapid urbanisation was placing enormous pressure on cities, with the United Nations projecting that almost 68 percent of the world's population will live in urban areas by 2050, while economic pressures were making it harder for households to enter the property market. She identified three priorities for the next phase of the housing programme: innovation in housing finance, integrated human settlements and stronger partnerships.