India needs to build 26,300 new houses every day of the 11the Five-year Plan: NHB

Mumbai: The National Housing Bank (NHB) says India needs to build 26,300 housing units per day all through the 11th five-year plan period to meet the housing requirements of all segments of the population at an investment of around Rs 10 lakh crore.

NHB has estimated an additional housing requirement of 45 million units for both rural and urban areas in the country during the 11th plan period, ending 2012.

The new NHB report's assessment is based on the performance of banks of the five year period commencing from the 1999-2000 financial year and paints a sorry picture of the coverage of the housing finance system in the country.

The report notes that the economically weaker sections that require almost 80 per cent of the total demand, are left to fend for themselves.

Analysing the performance of banks in housing finance over a period of five years from 1999-00 to 2004-05, the report reveals that loan disbursements went up by 68 per cent during the period to Rs 86,034 crore from Rs 58,623 crore.

However, the share for rural areas in the total housing finance had remained static at 10.3 per cent and share of semi-urban areas declined from 22.4 per cent to 15.4 per cent, whereas it went up to 47.3 per cent in 2005 in metropolitan areas from 37.2 per cent in 2000.