This dissertation is based on research undertaken on the role of the housing
group savings schemes that provide end-user finance to the poor households to
address their housing needs with special reference to South African Homeless
People's Federation (SAHPF) at Piesang River outside Durban. The housing
conditions inherited by the new Government in South Africa were characterized
by backlog. In order for the Government to address housing shortage, housing
subsidy assistance was introduced, which only provided the 'starter house', which
was not sufficient enough for the poor in terms of size and quality of the house.
It was hoped that the traditional financial institutions would come to the party
and provide small-scale loans to the poor to incrementally improve the condition
of their housing. The poor households have been seen as "unbankable". Basically
the study bids to explore and establish the effectiveness of the savings schemes as
an intervention in making end-user finance available to the poor households in
S.A. to meet their shelter needs. The study revolves wholly around the group
housing savings clubs as an intervention for proving housing for the poor.
Practice has proved that incremental upgrading of a core unit using incremental
finance is more suitable than long-term loans and does not bind the poor into
long-term financial agreements.
Given the fact that the poor are not willing to subject themselves into long-term
financial commitments, consequently, the poor households have initiated financial
self-help groups of the likes of ROSCAs, Stokvels, RCAs and ASCRAs as a
mechanism to deal with the predicament that they are facing. The study explores
the circumstances under which these saving schemes have evolved and the cause
of their proliferation, looking at the international and local experiences. The
study draws successful lessons from SAHPF of Piesang River about group
lending and the possible expansion of its activities to other parts of S.A. Lending
groups have the potential to provide affordable credit to the poor and the group
members will use peer pressure to encourage repayment. Group lending is
capable of making an individual repay that would have easily defaulted under
individual lending. The researcher uses the combination of sample survey and
case study to argue that the success of SAHPF particularly in making end-user
finance available to its members is due to its strong, central focus on savings and
loans. Finally the recommendations are that savings for housing purposes should
be seen as an appropriate mechanism, to augment the housing subsidy given the
fact that formal end-user finance is not forth coming especially to the poor as
anticipated. / Thesis (Arch.)-University of Natal, Durban, 2002.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:ukzn/oai:http://researchspace.ukzn.ac.za:10413/9454 |
| Date | January 2002 |
| Creators | Sibiya, Robert. |
| Contributors | Adebayo, Pauline Wambui. |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | en_ZA |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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