Joey Aguilar/Correspondent

Overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) should not ignore this: owning a house back home starts at Php100 (QR9.3) per month.
Aiming to provide a decent house for every Filipino, the Home Development Mutual Fund (popularly known as Pag-IBIG Fund) is urging OFWs here to register and avail of housing loans under its programme.
Charmaine Pamela V Bautista, information officer of Pag-IBIG in Qatar, told Gulf Times that registration is free and members are only required to pay a monthly contribution of Php100 (around QR9).
“Contributions also earn dividends which is tax free,” said Bautista, adding that the loanable amount for active members was raised from Php500,000 to Php6mn.
Bautista said around 54,000 of the 200,000 OFWs in Qatar have so far registered and some of them have availed of the loans.
From Php100 per month, a member can also increase his or her monthly contributions up to Php2,950.
“It is actually flexible and affordable to all. It has low interest rates, members could choose payment schemes and installment terms,” she said.
Interest rates are as follows: 7.985% per annum  for a three-year term; 8.985% for a five-year term; 10% for a 10-year term; 10.75% for a 15-year term and 12.250% for a 30-year term. Rates are compounded and fixed, meaning it would not change for the whole duration of the said terms.
“So for example, if it is a 30-year term, then the interest rate will not change for 30 years,” Bautista said.
Aside from buying house and plot, townhouse or condominium unit, housing loans can also be used for house completion, renovation and refinancing an existing loan. Members are also entitled of disability, insanity and death benefits.   
She also mentioned a number of OFWs in Qatar working as salesladies, housemaids and drivers who were able to buy their own house in the Philippines because of the programme.
Philippine Vice President Jejomar C. Binay, also the chairman of the Housing and Urban Development Co-ordinating Council and Pag-IBIG board of trustee, earlier awarded and personally handed the cash benefits to relatives of OFW Lourdes Rabe who died in Hong Kong.
Some of the benefits included Php37,000 cash (Pag-IBIG savings), Php6,000 (death benefit), fully paid house and lot worth Php575,000 and Php70,000 cash as reimbursements of insurance premiums on Rabe’s  housing loan.
Bautista also cited the case of a housemaid here who recently received a cheque amounting to P97,000 as savings and dividends from her 20-year total contributions.
Some OFWs like those who are working in Qatar Airways and other companies have benefitted from the Pag-IBIG housing loans.  
 In a bid to persuade more OFWs to register, Pag-IBIG headed by Bautista is holding continuous information drives, outreach programs and “registration on site” at different places in Doha.
“We are also co-ordinating with various Filipino organisations like the Leysambil (Leyte-Samar-Biliran) group and conduct orientation to their members,” she said.
Another scheme offered to members is the Modified Pag-IBIG II Program which gives higher dividends to members’ contributions in a short period of time.
Under the voluntary program, monthly contributions should not be less than Php500 for up to five or 10 years.
For example, a member who pays Php500 per month gets Php34,921.79 after five years or Php81,655 after 10 years. If monthly contribution is Php1,000 then the member could get a total of Php69,843 after five years or Php163,310.05 after 10 years.
Pag-IBIG has a total of 11.9 million members worldwide as of October 2012. It has approved total loans amounting to Php5.77bn for OFW members.
Bautista said that OFW Pag-IBIG members here could also apply and avail of other loans like calamity, salary, vacation, emergency, multi-purpose and even leisure loans which are being offered in the Philippines.
These loans could be used to open a new business, home repair, payment for tuition fees of children and others.
Asked why a lot of OFWs do not register and avail the programme, she said most of them are “probably earning more and already have enough savings to buy a house.”