Registration for the "Discounted Apartment" project opened and caused a great deal of interest.
This is a registration for a large lottery of about 10,000 discounted apartments in 150 different projects in 31 localities across the country - in the north, in the south and in the center.
28,500 households were registered.
The lottery comes after a long period in which no large lotteries were held for discounted apartments under government housing programs.
The current big lottery is the first in the new "Target Price" program, or in its new name "Discounted Apartment".
The current lottery includes 10,028 new apartments, all remnants of previous plans ("price per occupant" and "housing at a reduced price") and not the result of tenders for the new plan, which was only approved and launched recently.
This is the reason why you can also find 163 discounted apartments in Tel Aviv-Yafo and in some other locations that the new plan will no longer reach.
Up to 20% discount on the apartment
The largest complexes participating in the current big lottery are in Lod with 1,420 housing units, Acre - 1,035, Ashdod - 860, Dimona - 733, Ofakim - 521, Beer Yaakov - 512, Jerusalem - 462, Rishon Lezion - 409 and Tel Aviv with 163 units.
Minister of Construction and Housing Zeev Elkin,
The program is intended for the homeless and housing developers, and in its current format has also been expanded to the disabled population.
It offers a discount of up to NIS 300,000 or 20% of the price of the apartment for the lottery winners.
This is in contrast to the "price per occupant" which did not limit the amount of discounts.
The lotteries take place in cities where the average price per square meter is NIS 20,000, and in localities where the socio-economic profile according to the CBS indices is 4 and below.
Large loads on site
In light of the demand, there were those who reported a glitch on the site and that they were unable to enter the lottery.
For example, when the identification details were correct - it was written that one of the details was incorrect.
The Ministry of Construction and Housing explained that there were no faults but loads.
In addition, it was stated that "Registration for the 'Discounted Apartment' is open until March 29, and the date of registration for the lottery is irrelevant. Following the opening of the registration, there may be congestion on the site. For those who register early, "he said.
Construction in Dimona,
Eran Levy, CEO and co-owner of Altneuland, referred to data from construction starts published by the CBS and government plans, saying that "the plan presented by Lieberman, and the 'discounted apartment' program for those eligible, are not capable of bringing about change in the real estate market.
Firstly because they only cater to a limited segment of the population, something like 20% of the market, and hence they can not lower prices in the whole market.
Second, the total volume of apartments in them is not sufficient.
These are 30,000 discounted apartments.
They are not even half of the government's target for construction each year. "
According to Eli Avisror, CEO of Avisror Moshe & Sons and Acting President of the Builders Association: "All government plans have not proven themselves, on the contrary they have caused the housing crisis to worsen and deepen. Talk about price increases. The method needs to be changed urgently, no more "discounted apartment", "target price" or "reduced price", just flood the market with apartments and increase the pace of marketing for everyone throughout the country. "The specific discount, which will be determined by the contractor who sold the apartment to the eligible person. In addition, care must be taken to release the strict regulation and immediately address all bureaucratic barriers, shorten the period for obtaining building permits and significantly speed up all planning procedures.
Neighboring cities, big gaps
Indeed, only a few have won an apartment lottery under the "discounted apartment" program, so it is important to explore options for purchasing an apartment at a cheaper price.
An appraiser survey conducted by appraiser Israel Yaakov found that there are gaps ranging from hundreds of thousands of shekels to more than a million shekels, in the prices of new four-room apartments between adjacent cities at a distance of only 10 km.
The test is based on data from the CBS and the Tax Authority processed by Israel Yaakov. As part of the test, dozens of projects in cities in the central, Sharon, Shephelah and southern Israel were examined. Among the examples, Yaakov presents the cities of Ramat Gan and Tel Aviv, which border each other. Similar apartments in projects of the same standard, about 2-1 km apart, are sold at price differences of more than one million shekels on average.
In Ramat Gan the price is about NIS 2.51 million on average and in Tel Aviv NIS 3.87 million - a difference of NIS 1.36 million.
Buildings in Ashkelon, Photo: Dudu Greenspan
Construction in Ashdod (archive), Photo: Yossi Zeliger
There is a gap of about NIS 630,000 between the prices in the cities of Rehovot and Yavne: in the streets the price is NIS 2.55 million on average, and in Yavne NIS 1.92 million.
In the cities of Rosh HaAyin and Petah Tikva, price differences of NIS 500,000 were found: in Petah Tikva, the average price was NIS 1.9 million, compared with NIS 1.4 million in Rosh HaAyin. Between Haifa and Tirat Carmel, there were price differences of NIS 240,000. In Tirat Carmel - NIS 1.39 million on average. Ashdod and Ashkelon are the two southernmost cities examined. In Ashdod the average price was NIS 1.65 million, and in Ashkelon NIS 1.48 million.
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