Saudi Arabia is planning to inject nearly 70,000 new houses to citizens in the capital Riyadh as part of a strategy to expand their housing ownership, the Gulf Kingdom’s Municipalities and Housing Minister has said.

Majid Al-Hogail told local reporters in Riyadh on Monday that the world’s largest oil exporter has managed to expand that ownership from around 47 percent in 2016 to nearly 65.4 percent at the end of 2024.

He said the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s initiative to donate SAR 1 billion ($266 million) for citizens’ housing ownership would give a big boost to the sector.

“We have plans to inject nearly 70,000 new housing units into Riyadh...new units will also be supplied in other areas soon,” Hogail said.

The Minister noted that housing and municipalities have largely grown over the past years to exceed 15 percent of GDP.

He also said the real estate market jumped from only around SAR170 billion ($45 billion) 10 years ago to SAR850 billion ($226 billion) last year.

The construction sector was also one of the largest beneficiaries of foreign investments last year, receiving nearly 16 percent of the total, he added.

(Writing by Nadim Kawach; Editing by Anoop Menon)

(anoop.menon@lseg.com)

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