RIYADH — Minister of Housing Majed Al-Hoqail said that as many as 1.1 million Saudi families have started living in their own homes since the launch of the ministry’s Sakani program in 2017. “The Sakani program has exceeded its targets during the year 2020 by offering various housing services and solutions to 390,819 families, and thus has achieved an increase of 30 percent over the target despite the unprecedented circumstances that the housing sector witnessed in the year due to the outbreak of coronavirus pandemic,” Al-Hoqail said. He also noted that a total of 138,317 families have started living in their homes during the year 2020, and thus bringing the total number of families served by the program since its launch in 2017 to 1.1 million. “Despite the exceptional circumstances that the housing sector witnessed during the year 2020, we were able to score several achievements that have scripted as an unprecedented success story, and that have benefited more than 390,000 families of our people within the Sakani program,” he said. He expressed pride in the remarkable results achieved that exceeded the targets thanks to the fruitful national partnership between the public and private sectors, represented by developers and financiers. Since its launch in 2017, the Sakani program has provided a number of subsidized financing solutions to about 424,000 families with support of loans up to 100 percent for the purchase of ready-made housing units and units under construction and these cover partnership projects with the private sector as well as construction by citizens themselves. These are in addition to facilitating reservations of more than 122,000 families to benefit from the option of housing units under construction for Sakani beneficiaries within the Sakani program projects implemented by a number of qualified real estate developers. More than 18,000 families have benefited from the Developmental Housing program by providing suitable housing for them under the benefit system in cooperation with charities and with the participation of emirates of the regions and the issuance of contracts for residential land within Sakani township projects that exceed 122,000 plots through the Sakani site and application, in addition to issuing real estate tax certificates for 407,479 families.