A Government Housing Bank (GHB) project offering loans for low income earners to purchase a residence has received an overwhelming response as loan applications rose to 42 billion baht in value, two times higher than the amount earmarked for the loan scheme, just three days after opening for registration.
The government has approved the bank to manage the second phase of the One Million Houses project, aiming to support low income earners in order that they can buy their own homes.
The bank set aside loans to the value of 20 billion baht for the project and a loan offers a low interest rate of just 1.99% per year for the first 4 years. The maximum loan repayment period is 40 years.
The bank opened the loan registration period on Sept 10 via its GHB ALL mobile app.
The bank's president, Chatchai Sirilai, said that by yesterday the number of registrants had reached 34,926 with the value of loans applied for standing at around 42 billion baht.
On successful registration, registrants have to submit related documents to the bank and wait for loan approval. As of yesterday, the value of the loans applied for by customers who had already submitted applications with the relevant documents at the branches stood at over 1 billion baht.
The last date for the submission of documents is Dec 30 or when the loan received full approval.
Borrowers can purchase a new residence from any property developer or a second home priced at no more than 1.2 million baht.
Mr Chatchai said the bank has already relaxed the criteria regarding applicants' monthly salary to enable them to access a higher loan amount by basing their loan repayment on half of their net income rather than the usual level of one-third of their net income.
For an example, if an applicant has a net income of 10,000 per month, he or she is eligible to borrow a maximum of 1.2 million baht under the adjusted criteria.
The bank launched the first phase of the project in January 2019 with an initial loan value of 50 billion baht.