Flat prices and house rents will increase manifold due to the newly-introduced detailed area plan (DAP), the Real Estate and Housing Association of Bangladesh (REHAB) said on Sunday.
"The middle class people's dream to have sustainable and environment-friendly housing is fading away due to the detailed area plan. This plan will make it difficult for all to have quality and standard housing," said REHAB Vice-President (First) Kamal Mahmud during a press briefing on the upcoming REHAB fair, at a city hotel.
The REHAB fair will kick off on December 21 and will continue until December 25 at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre (BICC), he said, adding that there would be a total of 180 stalls at the fair.
Besides, there will also be three diamond pavilions, while building materials manufacturing companies and financial institutions will also join the event, he said.
LGRD and Co-operatives Minister Md Tajul Islam will inaugurate the fair as the chief guest, while State Minister for Housing and Public Works Sharif Ahmed and RAJUK Chairman Ansiur Rahman Mian are expected to attend the event as a special guest and the guest of honour, respectively.
Due to the reduction of Floor Area Ratio (FAR) in the new DAP, buildings in the capital Dhaka should not be more than three to four storeys high that will create a crisis of accommodation and thus lead to the higher prices of flats and skyrocketing rates of house rents, said the REHAB vice-president.
He said that there will be a state of imbalance between the demand and supply of flats.
After the circular of the new DAP gazette, members of REHAB could not sign any deed with land owners for development over the past four months, he said, adding that REHAB members are now working with their old projects.
He told the media that they had met LGRD Minister Md Tajul Islam and high-ups of Rajdhani Unnayan Katripakhya (RAJUk) to bring necessary amendments to the newly approved DAP, which came into effect from August 23, 2022.
The LGRD minister assured them of considering their rational recommendations, he said.
As per reports of Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, Dhaka is one of the mega cities in the globe.
The government incentives helped the real estate and housing sector overcome the crisis in the past, he said. "But this time we (REHAB) have been facing a lot of problems due to increased prices of construction materials and also DAP."
REHAB Vice-President (Finance) and Chairman of the upcoming fair committee Mohammad Sohel Rana said that the upcoming fair will create a bridge between clients and land developers or REHAB.
He assured that the REHAB members will try their best to provide flats and plots at competitive rates to the customers.
There will be a raffle draw every day during the fair. REHAB introduced the housing fair in 2001.
On the inaugural day of the fair, visitors can enter the venue at around 2:00 pm, while the timing for the remaining days is 10:00am-9:00 pm.
There will be two types of tickets. The price of a single ticket is fixed at Tk 50, while the price of the ticket with multiple entries is Tk 100. A visitor can visit the fair five times with a multiple entry ticket.
The whole amount of money collected from entry tickets will be spent for the destitute.
Director and also Co-chairman of REHAB press and media committee Md Sultan Mahmud, Director Md Qamrul Islam, Rotarian SM Emdad Hossain, Dr AFM Kamal Uddin, Dr Masuda Siddique Rozi, among others, were present at the event.
