Mina Salah did not expect his search for a home to turn into a long battle with contractors, one of whom holds a parliamentary seat and a membership of the Housing Committee. After he paid a down payment for a housing unit through a private intermediary, he discovered that the property was registered in the name of a fictitious person known in the market as “Kohail”, and that the handover process was being stalled endlessly. “They started asking for additional money, then the pressure turned into indirect threats,” he tells Zawia3, pointing out that in the end he was forced to sell the flat at a loss.
After that experience, Mina turned towards the social housing projects that the state announces as a safer alternative. He paid EGP 300 to buy a terms booklet for the “Housing for All Egyptians 3” project, then paid EGP 22,000 as a booking down payment, and set about completing the required documents. But after two months of waiting, he received a message informing him that he was outside the priority list. “It was a new shock,” he comments, “but I decided to wait for the next announcement.”
Mina adds: “I waited until the Social Housing Fund announced the project (Housing for All Egyptians 5), so I started the paperwork journey all over again. I had frozen EGP 30,000 in a piece of gold I was keeping, then I sold it and paid the booking seriousness deposit, in addition to the cost of the terms booklet. I waited about five months until I received a message saying that I initially met the conditions, and at that time I felt relieved. But after one more month, I received a new message telling me that I was outside the priority list, and that I had to wait for the next offering, buy a new booklet, and top up the booking seriousness deposit, which had risen in the new announcement to EGP 50,000.” He asks: “Why does the Ministry of Housing not postpone collecting the price of the booklets and the seriousness deposit until after the accepted applicants are announced? What does it do with all this money that is collected in advance?”
Over the past decade, housing projects have emerged as one of the main pillars of the Egyptian state’s discourse, particularly the social and middle-income housing projects supervised by the Ministry of Housing and the New Urban Communities Authority, with the aim of providing homes at subsidised prices for lower-income groups. However, the repeated experiences of citizens like Mina reveal a parallel picture behind the official scene: chronic delays in handover, a lack of transparency about the fate of payments, and repeated inflation of seriousness deposit amounts without clear guarantees. These facts raise questions about the mechanisms for managing that money, and the extent to which official bodies adhere to standards of governance and financial responsibility towards citizens.
Where does the bookers’ money go?
The testimonies of many citizens who spoke to Zawia3 about social housing projects converge in describing an experience that repeats itself in its details: delays in handover dates, non-refundable administrative fees, and terms booklets whose cost reached EGP 700 in the latest announcement, despite the limited number of units offered compared with the hundreds of thousands of applicants each time. This reality pushes many to question the usefulness of the procedures and the transparency of the handling of citizens’ money.
Among them is Ahmed Salem, an accounts employee at a private company in Giza, who recounts his experience, saying: “When I decided to apply for the social housing project in Sixth of October City in 2020, I hoped to get rid of recurring rent, especially after the big rise in prices. I paid the required down payment and kept up with the monthly instalments as requested, and the official promise was clear: handover of the unit within 36 months at most.”
But the date passed without any notification, and Salem entered a series of enquiries that were of no use. “I went repeatedly to the Hadayek October City Authority, and all I received were vague phrases: (implementation is under way, the project is in its final stages, handover soon), and nothing tangible so far,” he adds.
Today, now that we are past the middle of 2025, Salem is still without a housing unit and lives under the weight of double costs. “I pay a high monthly rent, and at the same time I keep paying a bank instalment for a flat I have not received, and I do not have a clear timetable explaining when this suffering will end,” he says angrily. He goes on to ask: “Is the ministry investing our money in other projects? And why does it not issue a clear financial statement explaining the fate of the billions that were collected? We are asking for nothing more than a commitment to deadlines, or at least a frank explanation for this delay.”
In 2022, Mona Abdel Galil, 44, an employee at a private sector company in Mansoura, obtained a booking number for a housing unit in the “Sakan Misr” project in New Mansoura City, in the hope of leaving her rented flat and settling in an owned home that would provide her with social and economic security. But since then, she has not received any clear notification regarding handover. She tells Zawia3: “I repeatedly contacted the competent authorities via the hotline and email, and the response was always the same: (the project is being implemented).”
She adds: “What worries me is that the financial collection is carried out with strict precision, while we do not find the same precision in completion or in respecting deadlines. I move around a lot because of the nature of my work, and the new home was supposed to give me a degree of stability, but it has turned into a source of constant psychological pressure.” She asks: “If the implementing bodies knew from the start that the funding was incomplete, or that the timetable was unrealistic, then why was the project offered? Where did our money go? And if there is no intention to profit, is this money being used in other projects without our knowledge? This ambiguity raises suspicions.”
From Alexandria, Khaled Fathy, 40, a public sector employee, tells a similar story. He says: “Since 2020 I have been paying instalments for a housing unit in the social housing project in New Borg El Arab City. The project was presented as a beacon of civilisation, but on the ground the area is still uninhabited, and basic utilities such as electricity, water and roads have not been completed, even though thousands have paid all their dues in full.”
He adds: “What is surprising is that the New Urban Communities Authority announced that it had achieved surpluses of billions of pounds from these projects, so how is that not reflected in implementation rates? Is there a gap between what is collected and what is implemented? Or is this money temporarily used to cover the deficit of other projects?”
He concludes his conversation by saying: “Some friends believe that the delay is caused by weak management, but I see that the problem is deeper and relates to the absence of oversight and accountability. We are asking for nothing more than transparency in managing our money, a clear timetable, and compensation in the event of delay. We have the right to know: is the state profiting from the money of housing bookers? And if it is not a direct profit, is this money being directed to other bodies at the expense of the actual beneficiaries?”
On the other hand, the Ministry of Housing attributed the reasons for the delay in handing over social and middle-income housing units to external factors, foremost among them the global economic crises that affected supply chains and raised the prices of building materials, which led to a clear slowdown in implementation rates. In press statements, Dr. Assem El-Gazzar, the former Minister of Housing, Utilities and Urban Communities, stressed that some delays were “beyond the ministry’s will”, insisting that efforts were continuing to hand over the delayed units within the announced timetables.
For his part, Prime Minister Dr. Mostafa Madbouly pointed out that the liberalisation of the exchange rate and the rise in the cost of building materials pushed some contracting companies to stop work, which required government intervention in the form of issuing a law to compensate contractors and grant them an additional grace period of up to nine months to complete their projects.
As for Mai Abdel Hamid, chief executive of the Social Housing and Mortgage Finance Fund, she stated in October 2024 that the fund had actually begun handing over the delayed units at a pace ranging between 8,000 and 10,000 units per month, expecting to complete the handover of all delayed units during 2025.
Regarding the stalled projects in New Alamein City, the Minister of Housing and Urban Communities, Eng. Sherif El-Sherbiny, acknowledged delays in handing over some units, pointing to intensive meetings held with the implementing companies and consultancy offices with the aim of accelerating completion rates, with a plan for gradual handover starting in mid-August 2024 and extending until the middle of this year.
To stimulate performance in the new cities, El-Sherbiny issued at the end of 2024 a package of 11 directives to the heads of the city authorities, which included doubling the pace of work and setting precise timetables for completing the units of the presidential initiative “Housing for All Egyptians”, with an emphasis on continuous follow-up of the implementation of the decisions and recommendations issued by the periodic meetings to ensure adherence to the set deadlines.
The citizen’s pocket as a solution to the government’s crisis
Dr. Karim El-Omda, professor of political economy, believes that the state has come to rely increasingly on citizens as a direct means of absorbing economic crises, stressing that “the pocket of the ordinary citizen has become the first, and perhaps the only, option for addressing financial imbalances, whether for the government or the various economic authorities.”
Commenting on the crisis of delays in handing over social and middle-income housing units, El-Omda points to the transformation of the state’s role from a body supporting economic housing into an actual competitor of the private sector, through launching middle-income and luxury housing projects such as “Sakan Misr”, “Dar Misr” and “Jannah”, which are offered as fully finished projects with high specifications, closer to the model of a commercial real estate developer than to government initiatives supporting limited- and middle-income groups.
He adds: “Continuing to hold citizens’ money for long periods before handing over the units, without compensation or return, is an unfair practice from an economic perspective. When a female citizen pays the price of an entire unit and remains waiting for years, the state has in practice obtained free financing, without any commitment to providing a return or even respecting the timetable.”
El-Omda warns that this phenomenon is widening in the context of rising interest rates, which exceeded 27% in Egypt last year, making holding on to liquidity attractive for the implementing government bodies, while the citizen alone bears the cost of the financial freeze and the losses resulting from the delay.
He concludes by pointing out that what is happening in some housing projects reflects an economic pattern based on postponing real solutions, in which bookers’ payments are used to cover temporary financial crises, and the units are then handed over years later at the same nominal value, even though their real value has been eroded by inflation and the loss of purchasing power, which ultimately represents a kind of forced transfer of the financial burden from the state to the citizen.
For his part, lawyer Yasser Saad, who specialises in rights and freedoms, considers that what is happening in some social and middle-income housing projects “legally amounts to a fully constituted crime of fraud”, pointing out that the Egyptian Penal Code defines fraud as deceiving others with a fictitious project in order to obtain real money, without providing guarantees or actual commitments.
Speaking to Zawia3, Saad explains that the fundamental problem lies in the lack of transparency: “The citizen pays down payments and instalments for a project without knowing when it will be handed over, or whether it will be handed over at all, or the number of units offered, or the selection criteria, which contradicts the rules of the Tenders and Auctions Law, which obliges the offering body to specify all the details of the project precisely before collecting any money.”
He points out that the mechanism adopted by some government bodies legally resembles the conduct of individuals who are tried on charges of collecting money without a legal basis: “An ordinary citizen is often referred to the prosecution or the Public Funds Court if he engages in similar conduct, even though what the state does in these cases is no different in essence.”
Saad stresses that the crime does not depend on the outcome of repayment, but on the intention behind the collection and its context: “Many believe that fraud is only complete if the money is not returned, but legally the crime is committed from the moment a fictitious project is offered in order to collect money, even if the money is later returned.” He adds: “If an official body receives a sum of money from a citizen, then returns it to him five years later without taking into account its purchasing value at the time of payment, this is considered a form of unlawful appropriation.”
He concludes by stressing that “arguing that these are common practices, or practices followed in other countries, does not exempt anyone from responsibility. We are facing an explicit legal violation that can only be interpreted as conduct falling under the crime of fraud, even if it was carried out under an official cover.”
Who funds the housing projects?
The projects rely to a large extent on the sale of units, and the Egyptian government allocated EGP 390 billion in 2020 to the social housing programme, with average annual spending of about EGP 8.3 billion over seven fiscal years. This funding consists of 40% direct government funds, 24% revenue from the sale of housing units, and 17% domestic loans. The Central Bank of Egypt also provided significant support by allocating EGP 20 billion in 2014 and an additional EGP 20 billion in 2019 to finance mortgages at low interest rates, which helped provide housing units at affordable prices for low-income families.
From abroad, the World Bank is considered one of the most prominent contributors to financing social housing projects in Egypt. In 2015, the World Bank provided a loan worth $500 million to support the social housing programme within the “Inclusive Housing Finance Program-for-Results” project, which focused on providing financial support to low-income families and promoting initiatives such as the Green Pyramid Rating System. The World Bank also approved in March 2020 additional financing worth $500 million to expand the scope of the Social Housing and Housing Finance Fund, while encouraging private sector participation in these projects.
The Ministry of Housing, Utilities and Urban Communities manages this money through the Social Housing Fund, which coordinates financing and implementation. The fund cooperates with several bodies, such as the Guarantee and Subsidy Fund to audit applications and allocate subsidies, the New Urban Communities Authority to build the units, the Central Agency for Reconstruction, and the housing departments in the governorates. The Central Bank of Egypt also plays a role by providing loans at low interest rates.
A gap between supply and implementation
By monitoring statements by sources, official data and press reports, Zawia3 tracked the numbers of applications to book social housing units in Egypt over the past ten years (2014-2024), revealing a huge gap between the number of applicants to book units and the number of actual beneficiaries of the projects. Over ten years, about 3 million citizens applied to book social housing units according to official estimates, while only about half a million families received real housing units.
In 2011, the Egyptian government announced a plan to build one million housing units within the social housing programme to provide affordable housing for low- and middle-income families. This goal was ambitious, aiming to meet the growing demand for housing in light of a shortage estimated at about 3.5 million units. By fiscal year 2022-2023, the construction of 594,571 social housing units had been completed within the “Social Housing” and “Housing for Every Egyptian” programme. This number represents about 60% of the original goal, which indicates significant progress, but not enough to achieve the overall goal.
During a social housing offering (63,000 units) in 2014, about 144,000 citizens applied to book, and about 60% of them were excluded for reasons related to documents and conditions (that is, about 57,600 were eligible for allocation at the time). 2016 saw a huge increase in demand, as one announcement recorded a record number of about 500,000 applicants. By the end of 2020, the Ministry of Housing reported that more than 1.5 million low-income citizens had applied to book social housing units through 14 announcements from 2014 to December 2020, and more than 380,000 housing units had been allocated to those applications (equivalent to about 380,000 families, about 1.9 million people).
By early 2021, the total number of allocated units had become about 335,000 units, and about 420,000 families had received housing units by mid-2022. As of 2024, official data indicate that the total number of applicants since 2014 reached about 1.6 million citizens within the presidential initiative “Housing for All Egyptians” (17 announcements up to September 2024), while the government has so far implemented about 690,000 housing units, which about 575,000 clients have received.
Yahya Shawkat, a researcher and analyst of housing and urban policies and founder of the Built Environment Observatory, believes that “buying housing depends on wealth, which puts lower-income applicants in competition with higher-income ones, even within the income limits set by the Housing Fund. In addition, a minimum income is required to guarantee repayment of the mortgage instalment, and the two conditions together close the door to a segment of the poor and the poorest.
He says in his conversation with us: “The best option, in the case of social housing, is to provide rent-based programmes, because rent depends on income and not on wealth. It is possible either to offer units under a rental system, or to provide cash support that the beneficiary uses to pay the rent of a unit on the market. With the current budget for subsidising social housing units, a larger number of families in need of housing can be covered through a rent support system, and more quickly, if not immediately.” He points out that “the system of building social housing for sale is called the ‘supply system’. That is, a certain number of units are built or planned to be built in certain places, according to the availability of plots of land at a low price or free of charge, first.
He continues: “The problem here is that the units are offered to applicants, and it happens that there are sites that see great demand, while demand is weak in other sites, or lower than the number of units offered. On the one hand, we find that the locations of some projects do not meet the need, so a number of residents remain deprived of social housing and are forced to wait for the next announcement; on the other hand, some units remain unsold, even though public money from the social budget was spent on them without benefiting from them; they are offered later in other announcements, or offered to income groups higher than those with limited income (such as middle-income groups), and these are considered attempts to correct the mistake.”
The urban planning expert says: “Since we are a country with a surplus of closed units, it is better to rely on demand-based rent support programmes. That is, studying the need in every city and village, and providing a budget at the local level to cover this demand.” He stresses that social housing projects have benefited a large number of families who live in them today, but that it is necessary to calculate the proportion of these families out of the total number of poor families in need of housing every year.” He gives as an example that there are about 800,000 new marriages every year. If we calculate that 30% of these new families, according to the latest official poverty rate, live below the poverty line and need subsidised housing, we will find that there are 240,000 families in need every year.
He adds: “These families do not necessarily remain in need forever. That is why rent-based programmes are more flexible: because they change and develop as families’ circumstances change and develop. There are those whose income increases after a while and who no longer need support, there are those who are financially comfortable and then their income falls and they need support, and there are those who travel or emigrate, among other cases.”
The social housing crisis in Egypt is no longer merely a delay in handing over units or a flaw in procedures, but has become a mirror of a deeper problem related to the trust gap between the state and the citizen. When citizens pay what they own in the hope of owning a flat, and do not get what they were promised after years of waiting, this not only threatens their living stability, but also shakes their confidence in the state’s ability to manage vital files fairly and efficiently. With the absence of clear financial disclosure and the escalation of citizens’ complaints, it becomes necessary for the relevant bodies to act quickly, not only to hand over the delayed units, but also to reform current policies and establish transparent mechanisms that guarantee citizens’ rights.
Editorial correction: The first version of the report stated that the World Bank loan for the Inclusive Housing Finance Program in 2015 amounted to $1 billion; the correct figure is that it amounted to $500 million, according to the World Bank statement issued in May 2015, and the bank then added financing worth $500 million in March 2020, bringing the total of the two financings to $1 billion.
