By IANS
Kolkata : National Housing Bank (NHB), the principal financial institution refinancing housing finance firms, plans to set up a mortgage guarantee corporation as a joint venture company with global partners to provide risk-cover to lenders against defaults in housing loans.
NHB is in talks with the International Finance Corp (IFC) and Asian Development Bank (ADB) for the venture, NHB chairman and managing director S. Sridhar said at a conference organised by industry body Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI).
The company plans equity investments in housing finance companies financing rural housing.
The minimum cap of investment will be around 11 percent while the maximum will be 26 percent.
The aim is to promote the establishment of dedicated housing finance companies in partnership with public-private institutions to enable increased flow of institutional credit for rural housing.
NHB has set a market-borrowing programme of Rs.75 billion in 2007-08 fiscal.
It also plans to launch a housing index for India – the "Residex" will be launched in 2-3 weeks and will initially include property prices of five cities.