RIYADH: Saudi families seeking to own their first home are set to receive further funding support thanks to a new agreement. The Kingdom’s Real Estate Development Fund and Saudi National Bank have signed a framework agreement to finance housing support programs, the Saudi Press Agency reported. This move is aimed at supporting beneficiaries, elevating affordability and raising the efficiency of the market in line with the Kingdom’s objectives for housing, one of the critical initiatives of Saudi Vision 2030. “We look forward to achieving more complementarity in partnership with all financing agencies to provide financing solutions for the updated housing support program packages, as part of the fund’s continuous efforts to facilitate the journey of beneficiaries owning suitable housing,” Mansour bin Madi, the Fund’s CEO and deputy chairman of the board, said. The deal comes after a series of agreements concluded by the Fund with financing agencies with the aim of diversifying housing support options for Sakani beneficiaries. Launched in 2017 by the Fund, Sakani is a real estate initiative aimed at supporting as well as enabling Saudi citizens to own their first home. There are currently five approved agencies that provide financing solutions to support the housing program packages, bin Madi explained. Saudi residents have been benefiting from the availability of more housing options as the number of residential rental deals surged 137 percent in June compared to the same month in 2022, the SPA reported last week. The rental index revealed that more than 240,000 deals were recorded, reflecting 190,000 more agreements than those posted in the same month a year earlier. The index aims to achieve transparency and stimulate investment in the Kingdom’s rental real estate sector. The government’s ongoing initiatives including access to finance are driving the Kingdom’s housing market while improving home ownership among the Saudi families, according to a report released by PwC Middle East in December 2022. Saudi Arabia’s housing demand stood at 99,600 houses in 2021 and was expected to increase by more than 50 percent to reach 153,000 houses by 2030, the report stated.