The Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria (FMBN) on Wednesday said it disbursed more than N7 billion loan to 800 beneficiaries in 2017.

Its Managing Director, Ahmed Dangiwa, disclosed this at the FMBN 2017 Management Retreat in Abuja, with the theme “Towards Improving FMBN Transaction Turnaround Time“.

Mr. Dangiwa noted that the focus of the bank’s loan was to ensure completion of ongoing projects and recover FMBN financial outlay presently tied.

He said that the bank recovered N2.4 billion in 2017 against a cumulative figure of N8.3 billion as at 2016.

According to him, the retreat will underscore the intention of the new management for a quick positive turn-around in all facets of the bank’s operations.

Mr. Dangiwa said that the bank was micro-managing some of the housing estates to forestall diversion of funds and ensure recovery of loans.

“The new management has also made a total refund payment of N6.6 billion to 44,370 beneficiaries in 2017 against a cumulative figure of N7.4 billion as at 2016.

“Our backlog of unaudited accounts is expected to be cleared before the end of the year,’’ he said.

The FMBN boss said the bank’s effort to implementing risk management framework was ongoing, while it was being assisted by the Institute of Directors to make the bank an institute of sound cooperate governance culture.

He said the mortgage market was subject to myriad of legislative requirements including the requirement for governor’s consent before a mortgage transaction could be legal.

In order to address this, he said, the bank created the Internal Records Office as an interim measure to secure its loans and provide some form of equity to cover loan facilities.

He said that the National Housing Fund (NHF) collection was growing steadily, adding that as a result of its strategic engagements, several non-contributing states had indicated readiness to re-join the scheme.

In a keynote address, the Minister of State II for Power, Works and Housing, Suleiman Zarma, tasked the bank to ensure adequate liquidity, develop secondary mortgage market and promote home ownership.

He said the challenges of a significant national housing deficit, the dearth of long-term funding and the high cost of housing delivery also placed enormous responsibility on the bank.

The minister challenged the bank to look into the NHF registration, collection and loan processes and initiate possible review towards reducing the current transaction turnaround time.

“These services are critical as they form the bulk of areas of the service needs of the public, and the manner the bank delivers on these services form most important indicators of the quality of services provided,’’ he said.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the retreat was attended by FMBN staff nationwide as well as delegates of Real Estate Development Association of Nigeria (REDAN) and Mortgage Banking Association of Nigeria.

(NAN)