LDA gets serious with estate developers

The Lahore Development Authority (LDA) is set to amend its rules regarding the imposition of penalties on real estate developers. According to the amended rules, the civic authority will penalise the developers of approved housing schemes if they fail to deliver their projects within the stipulated time.

According to a news source, the decision was taken in a recent meeting of the LDA’s governing body. Various issues concerning private housing schemes were discussed in the meeting, and according to the minutes of the meeting, the penalty will be imposed under the LDA’s Rule 36 of Private Housing Schemes.

The penalty will be decided in proportion to the remaining development work in case the developer fails to deliver the project within the promised timeframe. This means that the civic authority will not penalise the housing schemes with no development and the housing schemes with 70 to 80 percent of the development work completed in the same manner.

The news source reported further that the meeting also discussed the planning standards regarding the revised layout plans of the private housing societies. The authority witnesses various cases in which the housing schemes are first approved according to the planning standards enforceable at the time of approval, but after some time the developers apply for changes in the layout plan without adding more land to the scheme. The issue that arises is whether the revised plan will be approved according to the present standards or the previous rules will still be applicable.

The meeting, however, observed that the revised plan will be approved per the rules enforced at the time of approval.

The decision to impose penalties on private housing schemes, in case the developers fail to hand over their projects within specified timeframe, is a positive move by the LDA. With this amendment, developers will hopefully start focusing more on timely delivery of their projects, which is a major problem at the moment. In this regard, an LDA official told reporters that the changes in the rules would also prove to be helpful in resolving various other issues that arise in private housing schemes.