IMPACT OF PUBLIC HOUSING PROVISION ON RESIDENTIAL HOUSING DELIVERY IN ENUGU URBAN

ABSTRACT Housing sector plays a more critical role in a nation‟s welfare than is always recognized, as it directly affects not only the citizenry, but also the performance of other sectors of the economy.In Enugu urban, housing finance, delivery and maintenance is filled with excess problems especially for low-income earners who incidentally constitute the majority of the population. The acquisition of affordable housing by the low-income earners is not possible because of the lack of access to housing finance. This study assesses the impact of public housing provision on residential housing delivery in Enugu urban. The specific objectives were as follows: To determine the quantity of residential estates provided through Enugu State Housing Corporation in Enugu urban; to identify the effect of public estates on the residential housing provision in Enugu urban; to identify problems and constraints of the Housing Corporation in the provision and management of these housing Estates; to recommend ways of ameliorating the problems of Enugu State Housing Corporation with a view of providing more housing estates in Enugu urban.The study had a population size of two hundred and forty (240) out of which a sample size of forty (150) was realized using Taro Yemane formulae. The survey research design was adopted for the study. The collection of data was by administration of questionnaire and conduction of interview. The study revealed that Enugu State Housing Corporation has a positive impact in residential housing provision in the Enugu urban.The study concluded that urban areas across the globe arecharacterized by their own set of complexissues, the financial challenges are notably thesame; at all levels of economic development, therefore, there is a far greater financing need for urbandevelopment projects than can be provided bythe public purse alone couple with significant increase in the urbanpopulation over the last decade, combined withsluggish economic growth across many regions which has resulted in major gaps in housing delivery. Therefore, the study recommended that government should enforce the development and expansion of public-private partnerships to increase affordable housing availability.