NBP being the nation’s largest banking network, is playing a vital role in increasing the level of financial inclusion in Pakistan. Even in the tough time witnessed during COIVD-19 pandemic, the bank maintained the ethos & kept on pushing barriers & achieving milestones every passing moment.
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With 1505+ online branches and over 7 million customers, NBP has existence in areas where no other bank exist, thereby serving the entire populace. NBP is Pakistan’s largest public sector bank, and as such, its strategy is always aligned with government priorities. NBP, having its outreach in Pakistan’s remotest areas, has the opportunity to capitalize on this unique footprint and its name associated with security and convenience to attract the unbanked segments of society to open bank accounts.
NBP’s strong relationship with the “Ehsaas Program” and the “BISP” evidences this claim. Going to the next step, NBP advances strategy is focused on the well-identified and defined “Priority Sectors” of the economy. These inter alia include Agriculture, Small & Medium Enterprises, and Housing.
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Owning a house is always a dream, regardless of the income strata. This is necessary not only for security and comfort, but also for fostering social cohesion and development of a nation. Construction industry is also a catalyst for economic growth because a number of allied industries are associated with construction industry, and this creates opportunities. However, due to limited mortgage financing, very few Pakistanis can transform this dream into reality.
Hence poor access to affordable housing has become a compelling public policy issue. The existing government, cognizant of the issue, under the leadership of Prime Minister, Imran Khan, has taken a major step by engaging financial institutions to provide affordable housing to the masses with low subsidized mark up, especially those belonging to low-income strata.
Mera Pakistan Mera Ghar is a low-cost housing scheme initiated by State Bank of Pakistan, under the auspices of government, under which anyone who is a first-time owner can get housing finance up to 10 million at affordable rates with minimum documentation and fast processing.
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Aligned with government of Pakistan (GoP) priorities, NBP has geared its efforts to grow its housing finance portfolio aiming to enable home ownership for low- to middle-income market segment. NBP is playing a vital role as among the customers of NBP, there is a greater chunk which belongs to low-income population.
The Bank is facilitating in increasing the buying power by providing loans of longer tenure of fifteen to twenty years through its 680 designated branches and adequately trained workforce. NBP’s Low-Cost Housing facility can be availed for Home Purchase Finance (HP), Home Construction Finance (HC), Land Purchase + Construction (LPC), Home Expansion/Extension (HE).
The bank is also facilitating in developing new communities with access to infrastructure. This is done through real estate financing whereby project loans are provided to builders so that they can complete housing projects in the shortest possible time. This will prevent project cost overruns to a significant extent.
NBP has also introduced Mobile Unit Van to promote low-cost housing across Pakistan. A dedicated and trained team attends to the public queries to create awareness and handholding for financial literacy.
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Besides, a web portal form has been introduced and approximately 13,000 leads/queries have been generated by the bank. Initially, the banking industry faced a challenge on how to cater to Informal Segment, but this is also now being done through assessment of loan limit based on the actual expenses of the individual even if he/she does not have formal documented income.
Keeping in view the vision of Prime Minister, NBP has so far successfully facilitated 840 Families to have their own houses/homes. NBP has the honor of extending finance facilities in remote areas such as Gilgit, Mansehra, Bannu, Mardan, and Swat, beside other metropolitan cities.
In order to cater to the business, realtors have also been approached and corporate alliances are also in the pipeline.
Going forward, NBP, through perseverance will further strengthen its contribution towards low-cost housing, thereby moving hand in hand with the GoP initiative.