Pag-IBIG to grant discounts to home loan good payors

Pag-IBIG Fund members who pay their home loans on or before the due date will get a two percent discount under the Good Payor Incentive Program.

Vice President Noli de Castro, who also sits as concurrent chairman of the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council or HUDCC and the Pag-IBIG Fund Board of Trustees, has ordered for the completion of guidelines covering the grant of a two percent discount to members who pay their home loans on or before the due date.

The Good Payor Incentive Program is part of the non-wage benefits package announced by the President during the celebration of Labor Day last May. The program is a much-deserved reward to Pag-IBIG members who availed of housing under the old guidelines with interest rates then ranging from nine to 16 percent.

Last year, the Pag-IBIG Fund reduced its interest rate from nine to only six percent per annum for a P300,000 housing loan while the rate for P500,000 loan went down to seven percent from 10 percent. Under the new rates, the monthly amortization amounts to P1,798.65 for loans worth P300,000 and P3,326.51 for loans worth P500,000. At present, all housing loan packages have a maximum term of 30 years.

In 2006, the Pag-IBIG Fund released a total of P16.1 billion to 33,038 individual housing loan borrowers, the biggest in its history. It is recognized today as the single biggest provider of housing loans in the country.

In an effort also to make housing “truly affordable and accessible,” Pag-IBIG Fund has further reduced the interest rate for housing loans worth above P300,000 up to P750,000 to seven percent.

The latest round in the interest rate reduction is aimed at the middle-income bracket earning an estimated P16,000 to P20,000 per month, and who constitute 23 percent of the labor work force, according to the National Statistics Office. – Jasmin R. Uy/QSB