The Presidency has said the Tax Reforms Bill, when passed, will make housing more affordable and available to Nigerians by reducing tax burden on the construction and real estate sectors
The Chairman of the Presidential Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms, Mr Taiwo Oyedele, made this known in Abuja on Thursday at a Building and Construction Industry Forum.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the forum was organised by the Council of Registered Builders of Nigeria (CORBON) and Housing Development Advocacy Network (HDAN).
Speaking on the theme “Nigeria’s Tax Reforms and the Building and Construction Industry: Implications and Opportunities”, Oyedele said the bill has many benefits, but it is being misconceived by some people.
According to him, when the bill becomes law, Value Added Tax(VAT) on real estate transactions will be exempted, thereby lowering the cost of building materials and houses.
“The bill is designed in a way to favour low income earners contrary to what is being claimed, it will also ease their burden.
“There will be no VAT on lands, sale of real estate, and rent is exempted from VAT. Some of these are areas of controversies in the past.
“There is an exemption on stamp duties for rents below N10 million a month and capital gains tax is also exempted on the sale of dwelling houses.m,” he said
Oyedele added that, in the bill, building materials production including non- metallic products are eligible for priority sector incentives to boost production.
He said reforms will be carried out on land transactions including titling and harmonisation of property taxes.
“The Tax Reforms Bill will improve the affordability of housing. It will provide relief for people who are paying rent because what this bill is going to do is to remove a lot of the tax burden.
“The essence is to make life better for everybody and improve the economic activities in the building and construction sectors, and by extension, the whole of the economy,” he said
Oyedele encouraged Nigerians to seek more understanding of the tax reforms and stop relying on social media and headlines that were misinforming them.
Speaking in the same veins, the Minister of Housing and Urban Development, Ahmed Dangiwa, said the bill offers a whole relief to construction firms and contractors.
Dangiwa, represented by the Director, Public Building, Temitope Gbemi, said the ministry has fully aligned its housing policies with fiscal reforms.
He said they were also working with tax authorities to ensure that real estate and housing investments were guided by clarity, equity, and investor protection.
On his part, the CORBON Chairman, Samson Opaluwah, identified poor access to finance and multiple taxation as major drawbacks toward the expansion of the council’s potentials.
He expressed the hope that the tax reforms bill would address the challenges and more
The Executive Director of HDAN, Festus Adebayo, said the VAT exemption on lands, real estate and building materials producers was a welcomed development.
He advocated for incentives in the tax reforms bill that would attract real estate developers and investors to go into building low cost houses for low income earners.(NAN)
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