The real estate financing activity in banks, specifically directed to the individual segment, has grown over the past five years with a significant growth of 200%.
This was revealed by the Secretary General of the Media and Banking Awareness Committee of Saudi banks, Talaat Hafez, explaining that the volume of real estate financing for individuals in 2009 amounted to 28 billion riyals and increased by the end of the second quarter of this year to 84 billion riyals.
This comes at a time when figures released by the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency revealed the rise in real estate loans directed to individuals, as there was a significant increase in real estate loans granted by banks and banks operating in the Kingdom to individuals and companies during the fourth quarter of last year 2013. The total real estate loans granted by banks during the past year amounted to 113.7 billion riyals, including 70.3 billion riyals for individuals, an increase of 31 percent from 2012, and real estate loans granted to companies in the same period amounted to 43.4 billion riyals, an increase of 26 percent from 2012.
Real estate loans granted by banks and operating banks to individuals and companies during the first quarter of the current calendar year amounted to about 123.4 billion riyals, and real estate loans granted by commercial banks to individuals during the first quarter of 2014 increased to about 76.8 billion riyals, an increase of 33% compared to about 57.9 billion riyals during the same period last year. Many observers expect the volume of real estate lending in the Kingdom in the coming years to rise to much higher levels due to the growing demand for housing units and land, after the approval of the financing and mortgage systems during the current year.