The Government of Saint Lucia continues to demonstrate commitment to fulfilling its mandate of improving the standard of living for all Saint Lucians. As such government is ensuring that all Saint Lucians are afforded the opportunity to own a piece of land in their home country. In that regard, a number of housing developments have commenced island-wide, the most recent being the Talvern Housing Development.

Officials of the National Housing Corporation (NHC) have informed that the Talvern Housing Development will help remedy unplanned development in the area and increase land ownership. Phase 1 of the project consists of 49 lots totaling to 280, 373 sq ft and Phase 2 consists of 39 lots totaling 146, 860 sq ft of land. Former Chairman of the National Housing Corporation, Timothy Mangal provided some insight into Phase 3 of the development at the sod turning ceremony.

“Talvern Phase 3 is a total of 899,108 sq. ft. of salable lands into 132 residential lots and those lots of course range from 14,000 sq. ft. in the largest to 5000 sq. ft. as the smallest lot. There are also two commercial properties on this site, one for a community center. There’s one institutional lot, two open spaces as required by the Development Control Authority, one lot for a water tank, a WASCO water tank as this development will have its own water reservoir right at the top, with water propelled by gravity to the entire development and to this neighborhood.  This development was approved by the Development Control Authority in February of 2020 and certainly you could see the standard as you drove here, you could see the quality of the infrastructure so far.”

Representative for Fresh Start Construction Company Limited, Peter Felicien explaining Fresh Start’s role in the project, called for increased partnership with relevant agencies.    

“We are committed to give our Saint Lucian people a piece of Saint Lucia and the model that we have, is that we go in, we do all the designs we get the approvals, we go in we put the infrastructure and we get all the approvals and we get paid after the sale of lands. So we are hoping that more significant partners can come in. If you notice Mr. Boland is here I have not even mentioned the partnership with the banks because they are not present as yet. I am still hopeful that the banks will come in and be able to partner in ventures like this.”

Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries, Natural Resources and Co-operatives and Parliamentary Representative for Babonneau Hon. Ezechiel Joseph explained the options for individuals seeking to purchase land.

“The agreement is that those of us who want to go into a lease arrangement and let me explain that. You don’t have to go to Mr. Boland at the bank, you can go directly to National Housing and say look every month I am going to give you, $200 dollars I’m occupying 5000 sq. ft. the total is $35,000 dollars every month I am going to give you $200 dollars. That is what you call a lease purchase arrangement, which means you don’t go to a bank, but you rent the land and at the end of the 5 or 6 years National Housing Corporation will give you a deed of sale or you can go to Mr. Boland, get a loan from Saint Lucia Development Bank and the land will be sold to you at $6 dollars per sq. ft. So that’s the option you have and of course I am still negotiating to see how we can bring it lower.

Minister for Economic Development, Housing, Urban Renewal, Transport and Civil Aviation Hon. Guy Joseph promised residents of Talvern the best of services.

“This is a proud development for us. It is one that is going to be up to the highest standards of development. To the people of Talvern and Babonneau, we will give you nothing short of a world class housing development in Talvern.”

Managing Director of the Saint Lucia Development Bank Vincent Boland highlighted SLDB’s role and the importance of such ventures.

“We at the Development Bank, we have had an audacious goal in that we want to be able to partner with the Government and National Housing to be able to develop not only Talvern but to develop the sites that were identified around the entire island. So that it will give persons opportunities to have work in the actual developments and it will give persons’ access to that wealth creation. So it will be not just affording opportunities for all which is one of our slogans but it will be providing and creating wealth and transferring wealth to Saint Lucians.”

The National Housing Corporation is expected to commence work on Phase 4 of the project.