More funding ‘makes sense,’ housing minister says
Jonathan Fowlie
Sun
The provincial agency that hands out leaky-condo repair loans has applied to the government for money so it can continue to operate through the current slowdown.
On Tuesday, Minister of Housing and Social Development Rich Coleman said the Homeowner Protection Office (HPO) has applied for extra money, although he did not say how much.
“There is an annual lending rate that, when they achieve it, they have to apply to government for more money,” said Coleman, adding the request has not yet been approved, but suggesting it would still go ahead. “They’ve given us a funding request that makes some sense to me. We’ve put it forward to finance to deal with it.”
The HPO gets its funds through a $750 levy charged on all new residential construction units in B.C. Since being formed, it has approved more than $670 million in no-interest loans to help more than 16,000 households with repairs to leaky condos.
Coleman said that because of B.C.’s home-building slowdown the HPO’s income is “dwindling,” although did not give any further details.
The funding application comes after some owners of leaky condos said they were being shut out by the HPO, and had to resort to extraordinary means to finance expensive repairs.
On Tuesday, Coleman said he had heard recently about problems leaky condos owners are having getting loans, and said as a result he has now asked for a meeting with officials at the HPO.
“I’ve got them coming in later this week to see what they’re doing because obviously during the interregnum period we didn’t have any discussions about their situation during the period of time of the election,” he said. “The issue has been identified to me.”
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