LIC Housing to focus on affordable housing segment, take a call on project finance in FY25

Chennai, Feb 5 (IANS) Completing internal rejig, migrating to a new information technology (IT) platform and focusing on the affordable housing segment, LIC Housing Finance Ltd hopes to increase its loan book size by 15 per cent next fiscal, said a top company official.

He also said the company is looking at cutting down the Rs 2,000 crore non-performing assets (NPA) under the project finance segment and will take a call on this business line next fiscal.

The company was not focusing on the affordable housing segment. From the coming fiscal the focus will be on the affordable housing segment, Tribhuwan Adhikari, Managing Director & Chief Executive Officer told media on Monday.

On the project finance portfolio, Adhikari said it had shrunk as competition is into rate war. LIC Housing Finance is not comfortable with the rate offered by the competition.

That apart, out of the Rs 7,500 crore project finance portfolio of the company, Adhikari said about Rs 2,000 crore is NPA.

He said the company is trying to recover the loan offering one-time settlement and through legal recourse.

Total disbursements were Rs 15,184 crore in Q3 FY2024 as against Rs 16,100 crore for the corresponding period in FY2023.

Out of this, disbursement in the Individual Home Loan segment stood at Rs 12,868 crore against Rs 13,580 crore, whereas project loans were Rs 375 crore compared with Rs 427 crore for the same quarter in the previous year.

Queried about the internal rejig, Adhikari said from 24 backoffices, the company has gone in for 44 cluster offices for faster credit appraisal.

As regards the new IT platform he said, the way forward for onboarding of customers, lending and other aspects going digital is the way and went in for it.

After the initial teething problems, the system has stabilised, Adhikari added.

During the quarter ended December 31, 2023, LIC Housing has made a provision of Rs 50.32 crore in respect of Investment in Alternate Investment Funds (AIFs) pursuant to the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) circular dated December 19, 2023.

According to Adhikari, there needs to be some clarity on the RBI circular on AIF.

LIC Housing Finance closed the third quarter ending 31.12.2023 with an operational income of Rs 6,792.47 crore (Q3 ending 31.12.2022 Rs 5,870.84 crore) and an after tax profit of Rs 1,162.88 crore (Rs 480.30 crore).