…houses to be on display at Housing Solution 2017 and Beyond Expo

The Ministry of Communities has announced that preparations are underway for the construction of a 1000 homes “Housing Solutions 2017 and Beyond” model village project at Perseverance, East Bank Demerara.

At a press conference Monday, Minister within the Ministry of Communities,Valeria Patterson,made the announcement and said a massive housing exhibition will be held May 1 to 5, to display low-income, moderate-income and middle-income homes which will be constructed and sold by choiced local construction companies at the site. “We are setting up what we call a model village,” Minister Patterson told the press.

Several exhibitors signed an agreement yesterday with the Ministry of Communities committing their companies to the project;that houses built must be sold within six months. The agreement also states that prospective homeowners will not be allowed to do any form of modification to the houses until after five years, since it will be a model village.
“Model village meaning that the public can go to that location, see different models of low-income, moderate-income, middle-income homes and different types of building materials being used,and even though for our part, government, CH&PA, we’re going to focus to a large extent on local building materials; the exhibitors are not confined to just local materials,” the minister said.

She explained that at the end of the exhibition, the exhibitors are responsible for the sale of the homes. Prospective homeowners must have an application with Central Housing and Planning Authority (CH&PA),but if the individuals have none in the system, they can apply during or after the exhibition, as all applications must pass through CH&PA.
“Our objective … is to reduce the number of applicants that we have in the system and so we cannot afford to have persons who would have had a previous allocation now coming again and be able to purchase that house,” Patterson explained.

She said a survey will also be conducted by her ministry during the exhibition so that they will be informed about the popular choice of homes of the general population. “That survey will inform us first of all of the people’s choice;so if and when CH&PA decides that we’re going to continue to build low income, moderate, middle, whatever, we now understand rather than us giving what model we think… we’ll now understand what people need.”
The exhibitors will also have opportunities to engage patrons at the exhibition who already have lands at other locations but are interested in construction of one of the model homes on display.

On exhibit by the contracted exhibitors, there will be 10 low income homes, 5 moderate income homes and 8 middle-income houses, but the CH&PA will also have 6 duplexes and 2 single unit homes on exhibition. Technical institutes in Guyana will compete in building duplicates for a grand prize and a 3D model of the village, designed by the University of Guyana,which will be featured at the launch of Housing Solutions 2017 exhibition at The Pegasus Hotel a month before the May 1 event.

Meanwhile, Minister Valerie Patterson and a team will visit Poland soon to finalize talks with Canadian international housing company “Greenheart Timber Products” which has expressed interest in partnering with the Ministry of Communities in housing development here. She said executives of the company had visited her office in December with their expression of interest. She,along with Project Director Omar Narine and the Ministry’s Administrative Officer,were invited by the company’s executives to visit Poland where they will be able to observe housing projects done there by that company.