Council calls for regeneration of the property market

An effective revision of rent laws is necessary to bring the sky-high prices of property back to earth, a report drawn up by the Building Industry Consultative Council (BICC) says.

Presenting its yearly recommendations on the sustainability - or lack of it - of the Maltese property market to the Ministry for Resources and Infrastructure, the BICC yesterday said parliament should reach a consensus and effectively review rent laws to regenerate the rent market, even if this entailed amending the constitution.

"The building industry has played a vital role in the Maltese economy, but with property prices on the increase, the lack of space and the number of empty dwellings reaching 23 per cent of all houses in Malta, the government should create incentives to really regenerate the property market," said BICC chairman Robert Musumeci.

The BICC suggested a policy to encourage people to live in old villages from where many people have moved out. Old houses were being abandoned and left to deteriorate.

"This should be fought by planning policies and incentives for people to refurbish these old dwellings and to go to live in them again. At Malta Environment and Planning Authority level, applications for the restoration of old houses should be processed without unnecessary delay and bureaucracy."

When it came to building new villas, the BICC report pointed out, the "percentage coverage" occupied by the building should go up from between 30 and 40 per cent, to 50 per cent. This would mean that more villas could be built on a specific plot of land.

"A development policy for building small apartments instead of terraced houses should also be adopted," the report said.

There were 12,394 contracts on transfer of property in 2002, a considerable rise when compared with the same statistic of 1998, when 7,091 transactions were registered.

While the demand for smaller property had risen from 23 per cent in 1995 to 27.4 per cent in 2002, fewer people wanted to build terraced houses and more were opting for small apartments or flats. Therefore, the BICC said, the law should provide for the possibility of building multi-storey units.

The government should intervene to make up a registry of property and local plans should be concluded once and for all, with proper road access to all areas.

The government should facilitate through fiscal incentives the liquidation of inherited property that is owned by a number of inheritors.

According to the BICC, the purchase of property by foreigners has had a positive effect on the Maltese economy, especially in historic areas where there was little or no interest on the part of the Maltese.

Finally, the report suggested that the country should make an effort to use alternative energy sources at domestic level, such as solar water heaters.

Mr Musumeci said the BICC, which is a sort of think tank involving all stakeholders in the sector, drew up the report after testing the pulse of the industry by getting the views of all those involved in the property market.

Speaking at the news conference yesterday, Resources and Infrastructure Minister Ninu Zammit said he agreed wholeheartedly with a number of the recommendations yet he was sceptical about some of them.

He said the Building Industry Consultative Council would be beefing up some of the recommendations and reviewing others and added that the public was being asked to comment on the recommendations for there to be widespread consultation.

The minister said development policies should be devised to make the market sustainable and, most importantly, with the social realities of the country in mind.

"My wish is to see our localities develop in the true character of old Maltese villages. While it makes sense to build high apartments where there are already high buildings, I think the skyline of villages should be respected. The highest buildings of old villages used to be the Churches and this is a characteristic we ought to conserve," said the minister.

Mr Zammit mentioned the small squares in old villages, which he said served as a recreational area.

"With such densely populated plans, local plans should really keep people's recreational needs in mind," he said.