Sheinbaum Says Infonavit Plan Will Restructure 5 Million Mortgages
President Claudia Sheinbaum says the Infonavit housing plan will reach 1.8 million families and restructure 5 million home loans. What she said in Chiapas.
President Claudia Sheinbaum said on Sunday that the federal housing program run with Infonavit (the National Workers’ Housing Fund Institute) will benefit 1.8 million families and aims to restructure 5 million mortgage loans. She spoke in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, while handing over homes under the Vivienda para el Bienestar (Housing for Well-being) program, according to El Universal.
Sheinbaum used the event to defend the changes at Infonavit and at Fovissste, the housing fund for state employees. She said debts that had grown out of proportion are now being forgiven in full, and that some borrowers are even getting money back.
Loans that “never got paid off”
The president described how the institute worked under earlier governments. According to her, Infonavit built homes far from urban areas, some of only 40 square meters, and many of its mortgages turned into debts that borrowers could never finish paying. She said Fovissste stopped building housing altogether and focused on handing out loans.
She read out examples of debts that had grown as much as three times. In one case she cited, a person took a loan of 104 thousand pesos, kept paying for years and ended up owing one million pesos. Sheinbaum called the old system “pure usury” and said the current policy is a matter of justice, because those borrowers had already paid what they owed.
Who runs the program
Sheinbaum credited three officials with designing the plan: Octavio Romero, director of Infonavit; Edna Vega Rangel, head of Sedatu (the federal agrarian, territorial and urban development ministry); and Jabnely Maldonado Meza, director of Fovissste.
She responded to critics who say the government is draining Infonavit and Fovissste. Citing Romero’s earlier explanation, she said both institutions now have more resources than before.
What it means for borrowers
For workers with an Infonavit or Fovissste mortgage, the president’s figures point to a program of large scale: 5 million loans set for restructuring and 1.8 million families set to benefit. Borrowers whose balances grew far beyond the original loan are the group Sheinbaum singled out, saying their debts are being cancelled entirely.
El Universal’s report did not say how borrowers qualify for the restructuring, how the forgiveness is calculated or how many of the beneficiaries live in Mexico City. Sheinbaum described the government’s role as speeding up paperwork for people who spent years working to get their loans.
A political message in Chiapas
Sheinbaum, who called the handover “the happiest day of my life,” tied the housing program to her government’s wider spending on infrastructure. She listed new homes, hydroelectric plants, trains and roads as the reasons for what she called unity between the people and the government.
The homes delivered on Sunday are in the Los Poetas 1S housing development in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, the capital of Chiapas.
Source: El Universal
