Increase in property taxes badly affects real estate business

MCCI president urges govt to address the issue urgently

MULTAN: The real estate sector plays a key role in economic development of the country, but due to imposition of heavy taxes it is mired in problems, said Multan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MCCI) President Malik Asrar Ahmed Awan on Monday.

He urged the government to rationalise taxes on the important sector to facilitate growth of business activities.



In a statement, Awan said businesses of thousands of people were directly or indirectly linked with real estate, but the increase in taxes had disrupted business activities in the sector, which would impact growth of the economy.

Owing to taxation problems, many investors were pulling out of the sector and if the government did not resolve the issue on a priority basis, unemployment could further increase, the MCCI president cautioned.

“The chamber will raise the issues of real estate sector at all relevant forums and will fully cooperate in efforts to provide relief to this sector.”

Awan emphasised that the government should revise tax rates to provide relief to the realtors. He said the Multan Development Authority (MDA) had increased the commercialisation fee on real estate, which created additional problems and urged the fee should be brought down.



He lamented that the MDA director had approved many reforms for the real estate sector, however, they had not been implemented as yet due to which problems still persisted.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 17^th, 2017.

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