Housing in Southern Africa July 2016

Entrepreneurs Inner city housing specialists, Wayne andRenney Plit, founders and until recently co-owners of Afhco, were trail blazers in the sector and together created a sizeable housing portfolioworth R1,7 billion over the past 20 years.

Q uiet, efficient and purposeful, Wayne’s expertise in building and Renney’s meticulous at- tention to financial detail scaling up projects have proved to be a winning formula. The Plit brothers readily acknowl- edge the huge contribution that the NHFC has played in Afhco’s success and that without funding, from the state owned entity, they would not be where they are today. “NHFC was the only one willing to fund developments in the ‘red-lined’ inner city of Johannesburg 16 years ago,” says Renney. Partnering with the NHFC and be- ing clearly focused on the financial model, the business, the process of accessing a plethora of projects and making a judgement call on each, has allowed Afhco to create its portfolio of social, rental, rent-to-buy, instal- ment sale, and, of course, to repay the NHFC loans. The Plit brothers didn’t waste time approaching commercial banks, as they would not invest in the often dilapidated inner city precincts. Renney says that Afhco delved into Joburg’s inner city and the city blocks were indeed under attack from slum lords, hi jacked buildings, and they developed, he says, “where angels feared to tread”. Afhco is only one of a long line of developers who built a strong foun- dation through theNHFCandassisted national government in delivering on its housing mandate with afford- able, social and rental housing. Even through difficult periods Afhcomet its financial obligations to the NHFC. Plit cites one examplewhere the brothers had planned to develop 3 500 units in Protea Glen, Soweto. After a short time on the project, they experienced political interference, the culture of non-payment and general dissension and decided to walk away with only 60 units complete and absorbed the entire loss. Of course, this built a great deal of trust between Afhco and the NHFC, as they serviced their debt to

the state entity. This was small fry in the end as the brothers continued to work hard and smart to create a sizeable portfolio. Plit shares much about their jour- ney with the NHFC and Afhco’s hum- ble beginnings, renovating buildings and selling sectional title units to the end user market. This however came to an abrupt halt when the com- mercial banking sector red-lined the inner city. “We then started our own fundingmodel, instalment sales, sold units and funded end users ourselves. We created a substantial book and retained the title deed until such time as the purchaser paid off the debt. Only then did transfer take place.” The Plit brothers were also in- volved inGatewayHomeloans project before the NHFC came on board and the state-owned entity bought Afh- co’s instalment sale debtor book. The capital from the debtors book sale enabled the Plit brothers to continue developing. Afhco continued to pro- vide NHFCwith batches of instalment sales at a discounted rate and Afhco continued to collect the debt, and settle with the NHFC. In those days the instalment sales were over a five year period, of course, affordability was always an issue and eventually extended to six years and finally a 12 year instalment period. Afhco was also registered as a social housing institution and this en- abled the purchaser to tap into a state subsidy of R16 000 per unit, which was credited to Afhco, plus the buyer paid a R10 000 deposit and owed Afhco approximately R30 000. The end users who bought apartments Afhco developed in the early days for between R40 000 and R50 000. Those same units today are worth between R250 000 and R500 000. Renney says, “It was a good way of building a capital base for the low income earner.” Adding that subsequently Afhco stopped selling off units, “As we felt that the rental market was the growth area and we

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