Mrs. Dorothy Obata is the Head, Business Development of Nigeria Mortgage Refinance Company (NMRC), a Central Bank of Nigeria Licensed Mortgage Liquidity Facility. Its core mandate is developing the primary and secondary mortgage markets by raising long-term funds from the capital market and thereby promoting the implementation of an affordable home scheme in Nigeria.
A fortnight ago, the company (NMRC) was one of the exhibitors at the Lagos State Real Estate Transaction Department event, at Eko Hotels & Suites. The Head, Business Development (NMRC), Mrs. Dorothy Obata, was there and he spoke exclusively to City People’s Senior Reporter, ISAAC ABIMBADE, on the importance and procedures to follow while seeking mortgage loans from NMRC. Below are excerpts.
Let’s get to know more about you?
My name is Dorothy Obata. I work for the Nigeria Mortgage Refinance Company (NMRC), as the head of Business Development.
Tell us what Nigerians should know about NMRC?
The first thing Nigerians would want to know about NMRC is that there is a company here now whose responsibility it is to make sure that every Nigerian can own his or her home. Whether such Nigerian lives here or outside the country.
NMRC can be defined as a liquidity facility, which means that we provide funding to ensure that Mortgages are created for Nigerians who want to buy houses. So, the way it works is that we are secondary mortgage lenders. The primary mortgage lenders consist of Commercial Banks and Primary Mortgage Banks. They are the ones who directly interact with individual Nigerians who want to buy a house. The individual Nigerians go to them after he or she has identified a (completed) house he wants to buy, and that individual makes a request for a mortgage that he or she needs to meet the financial requirement to make the mortgage available, while the primary mortgage lenders give the mortgage to the person by a way of paying for the house on behalf of the person. Of course, that individual has to have an equity contribution or down payment of a certain per cent of the cost of the house. That is what it is in a nutshell.
And you would wonder how the NMRC comes in? After the mortgage has been availed, the primary mortgage lender comes to NMRC to have this mortgage refinanced. And what does this mean? It means, NMRC now provides liquidity. The NMRC returns the money the primary lender has given out as a mortgage to the primary mortgage lender, to enable him to originate or provide more mortgages for more people.
Most people out there still think that it is hard to access loans, and that the process is cumbersome. What is your take on this?
Yes, I am aware that there’s a negative belief among the people of Nigeria about mortgages, because a lot of people have had their fingers burnt in the past and a lot of people have also had bad experiences where they would apply for mortgages and they would wait long-time funds and the mortgages are not availed. And we have had the experience, that after a while, they’ve applied, they won’t get the amount as it would not be made available. And we have also had a situation where they went for mortgages and they say, all we can do is give a 5-year mortgage. Mortgages are naturally long-tenured transactions. So, all of these are what NMRC has come to address.
One, NMRC makes long-tenured mortgages available. We provide as long as 15 to 20 years of tenure.
Second, the issue of having to wait and wait, you apply for mortgages, they would say come today, come tomorrow. You don’t have to wait any longer because the funds are actually there waiting. Because NMRC will readily go to the capital market to raise funds. Our bond issuance programme allows us to do N140 billion in bond issuance to refinance mortgages.
And because the money is there, there is no story. As a matter of fact, if you apply for a mortgage; a mortgage to be refinanced by the NMRC or a mortgage under NMRC Mortgage Programme, through the banks we partnered with, if you do that and your documents are complete, in two weeks, you should be able to get out your mortgage; your mortgage should be ready.
Tell us more, especially what people don’t know about NMRC?
We are very aware in the NMRC that there is a knowledge gap and awareness is not there. Like I earlier said, a lot of people have had unpleasant experiences when it has to do with mortgages, but a lot of these are been addressed by NMRC. So, what we had done is create awareness on radio and social media platforms, to sensitise people about what NMRC does, like how you can actually get a loan in two weeks, once all your documentation are complete. So, we are running a lot of awareness programmes, this programme happened to be one of them. We have also developed a programme to go to different organisations and talk to their staffers about the NMRC programme and the benefits to the Nigerians.
What qualifies you for NMRC programme?
No 1, you have to be a Nigerian. You have to be 21 years old and above. You have to have a verifiable source of income and that verifiable source of income doesn’t mean you have to be a salaried person. You can be a salaried person, in other words, you have structured employment, and you have a fixed amount coming in every month.
You can also be self-employed. You can be someone in the informal sector like people who do other jobs, whose incomes are not regular. So, once you are a Nigerian and you have a verifiable source of income, then you are qualified. Then, by the time you go to the primary mortgage lenders, they will prequalify you and let you know what your income could accommodate in terms of monthly repayment or periodic repayment of the loan.
