Foreign housing developers, builders find event beneficial

 Jang-Abad Expo

Islamabad: The three-day Jang-ABAD Expo 2017 ended on a high note here at the Pak-China Friendship Centre on Sunday with both local and foreign housing developers and builders as well as visitors finding the event beneficial.

Compared with the first two days of the expo organised by the Jang Media Group in collaboration with the Association of Builders and Developers (ABAD), Sunday attracted larger crowds of people.

At the stalls put up by the country’s major and some foreign builders and developers, visitors learned about their previous, current and future projects, and sought guidance on the available house building and real estate investment options.

The developers responded to their queries, offered them attractive packages to suit their needs and pockets, and even booked plots, houses and apartments. ABAD Chairman Mohsin Sheikhani declared the expo a big success and said such events would be held in other parts of the country, too.

He said the most important aspect of the event was the launch of a nationwide low-cost housing scheme starting from Islamabad. He said the ABAD registered a large number of the poor and salaried people for the scheme under which five-marla good houses would be given to them at the price ranging from Rs 1.5 million to Rs 1.9 million each.

“As our social responsibility, we will develop the best possible, complete housing units, which don’t look low-cost in any way, at a time when the country faces the shortage of 12 million houses,” he said.

The ABAD chairman said the people’s response to the low-cost housing scheme was overwhelming and that the ABAD would strive to live up to their expectations while expecting relief from the government in taxes, documentation fee and cost of utility services for the allottees.

He said the government should encourage and trust private developers and builders to further the national cause of providing the people with good, affordable shelters. Mohsin Sheikhani said his organisation having more than 800 countrywide companies as members had found the event to be advocating its mission of unifying and streamlining the private sector construction activities in the country.

He said the ABAD’s activities mainly took place in Sindh, mostly Karachi, due the massive construction of high-rise apartment buildings though more and more multi-storeyed housing units were being put up in Islamabad, Lahore and other parts of the country, too, due to the growing public awareness.

“We act as a bridge between the builders and developers, and the relevant government agencies to make things happen smoothly. We ensure friendlier government policies, simplification of taxation, ending of housing shortage, and management of the slum dwellings,” he said.

The stallholders appreciated the holding of the expo and said they got good response from the people. They said the event besides helping them market their products and services also highlighted the nationwide and foreign real estate investment opportunities, the issues and challenges facing stakeholders, and ways and means to effectively address them.

Pledging to provide the people with high-quality yet affordable houses, the developers called for the holding of such events in future, too. Mohammad Faisal, a representative of the Dubai-based developer Sobha, said the people of Pakistan showed keen interest in his firm’s projects, including Sobha Hartland, the only luxury community development located on the Dubai Water Canal, and expressed the desire to visit the sites soon.

He said the Sobha’s potential clients from Pakistan, including members of both upper middle class and upper class, didn’t want completely shift them to Dubai and instead, they wanted to either avail themselves of real estate investment opportunities in the UAE port city or have holiday homes.

The foreign participants, including Chinese nationals, said they were happy to see the Pakistani government pursue investor-friendly policies and therefore, they were exploring the options of investing money in the country.

Most visitors showed interest in developing own houses using savings and called for low-cost housing schemes for low-income groups. At the end of the event, the organisers distributed shields to the participants. Also, a ‘lucky draw’ was held to give away prizes to the visitors picked out.