MANILA, Philippines – The Government Service Insurance System (GSIS), the state-owned pension fund, will provide an initial P5 billion for housing loans to be administered by state-owned Home Development Mutual Fund (HDMF)) or Pag-IBIG Fund.
In a press briefing yesterday, GSIS president and general manager Robert Vergara said the agency is ready to provide P5 billion to Pag-IBIG, the state-owned agency that provides housing loans to borrowers.
“We can make funds available to the housing agencies. P5 billion is a good start,” Vergara told reporters yesterday.
This as the agency suspended its housing loan program earlier, saying that state-owned home agencies such as Pag-IBIG are better off handling these types of loans.
“We are not really a housing agency but a pension fund. We don’t have the capability to run a home lending program,” Vergara said.
He noted that last year GSIS only lent out P1 billion worth of housing loans.
Vergara stressed that the agency’s move to suspend all its housing programs does reflect the agency’s finances. “Our funds are very solid,” he said. He noted that as of end-March, the agency’s assets amount to P580 billion.
Vergara said the agency wants to avoid duplication of functions with other government agencies.
He also said that while it is within the mandate of the pension fund to provide housing loan programs, it is primarily a pension fund and not a housing institution.
Members’ applications and existing housing loans filed before April 28, 2011 would continue to be processed and serviced. Policies and procedural guidelines for GSIS housing programs will remain in effect for these housing loans.
With the suspension, Vergara said the pension fund would be able to focus on other types of loans it can offer to its members and pensioners.
To date, around 85 percent of GSIS’s loan portfolio is into short to medium-term loans namely the consolidated loan, the emergency loan, the one-time cash advance, the policy loan, and the pension loan, which can be availed online.
Vergara said that the suspension of the housing loan program would not affect the pension fund’s financial position. -Iris C. Gonzales (The Philippine Star)
