CREBA appeals anew to spare housing from VAT
The Manila Times

THE country’s largest real estate and housing developers group has appealed anew to avert the looming value-added tax imposition upon housing purchases as millions of Overseas Filipinos and low-income earners who have yet to acquire homes of their own continue to suffer from the negative effects of the worldwide Covid-19 pandemic.

Among other measures to stimulate the property industry, this call-out by the Chamber of Real Estate and Builders’ Associations, Inc. (Creba) to government takes a high pitch as availment of VAT-exempt home packages granted a three-year reprieve under Republic Act No. 10693 or the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (TRAIN Law) ceases by December 2020.

This, against an eerie backdrop of a housing backlog of at least 6.57 million units, with supply and demand gap getting wider by 300,000 units every year.

Lamenting that housing has always been ‘heavily-taxed and highly-regulated’, Creba National Chairman Charlie Gorayeb and National President Noel Toti Cariño appealed for the immediate issuance of an appropriate BIR revenue ruling to preserve the status quo on VAT-exempt housing packages and provide the millions of yet homeless Filipinos the chance to a dignified quality of life through decent and affordable homes.