Indian Housing Financing Corporation (DHFL) and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) have recently launched Aadhar Housing Finance (P) Ltd. to expand into India’s lower income markets. Starting in Uttar Pradesh, Aadhar Housing Finance will offer home loans and home improvement loans of approximately $13,000 to lower-income communities that are unable to easily access formal funding. Dewan Housing Finance Corporation Ltd. (DHFL), India’s leading housing finance company today announced the launch of “Aadhar Housing Finance (P) Ltd” along with IFC, a member of the World Bank Group.
Aadhar Housing Finance (P) Ltd (Aadhar) was envisaged by both, DHFL and IFC as a focused HFC that will reach out to the low income segment in the low income states of the country, after looking at DHFL’s commendable track record of 26 years of lending to the LMI (lower and middle income) segment and the huge contribution made by DHFL in the various rural housing schemes of the GOI under the aegis of NHB.
Starting from Uttar Pradesh, Aadhar will reach out to the low income segment and enable financial accessibility to this segment that has limited access to any form of formal lending. The company will provide loans upto Rs. 6 Lac and will offer home loans, home improvement/extension loans, plot loans, self construction loans and gradually extend products such as mortgage loan, lease rental finance and non-residential property loan/s. Aadhar will also refinance project loans essentially for development of low cost housing projects.
Mr. Kapil Wadhawan, Chairman and Managing Director, DHFL and Chairman, Aadhar, said, “Our focus has always been to enable financial accessibility to the lower and the middle income segment and the launch of Aadhar provides us with another platform to reach out to a specific set of people who are eligible but have no access to formal sources of funding”.
“We express our deep gratitude towards IFC to understand our vision and partner with us in this cause” added Mr. Wadhawan.
The company inaugurated its first branch in Lucknow, UP and will soon start operations in the other low income states like Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand, Orissa Chhattisgarh and Bihar.
Mr. Thomas S. Davenport, IFC Director for South Asia, said “There is a huge demand for housing finance in these states and Aadhar will ‘serve as a model establishment’ to encourage entry of private players in the untapped segment. IFC’s investment in Aadhar fits well with IFC’s objectives of providing access to affordable housing finance to the people at the base of the pyramid”.
IFC has 20% equity with an investment of $4,400,000 and DHFL along with its subsidiary DHFL Vysya HFC has the remaining 80% equity in Aadhar.
Speaking on the occasion, Mr. Harshil Mehta, CEO, Aadhar said ”Our effort is to provide a platform for the common man to improvetheir standards of living at affordable means compared to the conventional source of funding”
“We do hope to bring about the change envisioned for our customers in fair terms and hoping that the vast learning’s from DHFL will enable growth for Aadhar” added Mr. Mehta.
Aadhar has earmarked its expansion plan and will operate in a hub-n-spoke model to reach out to its customers across the states.
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