Saudi to face ’substantial’ housing shortage by 2015

Saudi Arabia will face a ’substantial’ housing shortage by 2015 as a growing population and rising employment fuel demand, Deutsche Bank said.

The kingdom will require an estimated 1.2 million additional homes by 2015, compared with a projected supply of just 900,000, the German bank said in a report yesterday. That amounts to a shortfall of 25 per cent.

‘Government initiatives to enhance living standards and improve mortgage access will boost affordability and unlock huge latent demand,’ Dubai-based analysts Nabil Ahmed and Athmane Benzerroug wrote. The kingdom’s market ‘is the strongest in the Gulf’ and has remained relatively resilient.

Saudi property prices were down 15 per cent year-on-year as of the third quarter, compared with an average slump of 40 per cent in other Gulf markets, the report showed.

Source: Business Times, 10 Nov 2009