Duty Free building materials for Housing Developers 

By Dana Malcolm 

Staff Writer 

#TurksandCaicos, April 13, 2023 – The Government is sweetening the deal for anyone thinking about developing an apartment complex as residents building long term rentals in the Turks and Caicos, will soon be eligible for up to 100 percent in duty exemptions on their building materials, according to Jamell Robinson, Minister of Physical Planning and Infrastructure Development.

The Minister was a guest on Financially Speaking on RTC FM hosted by Drexwell Seymour.

Mentioning the ambitious 600 home per-year quota that the Government will have to fill for years to come Robinson said, “We’re looking to give anyone who is building 5 units or more up to 100 percent duty free so you can make your application.”

When the Housing Committee is operationalized, it will be up to that body to decide on these concessions. In addition, he said those concessions should still apply whether the building was for sale or rental as long as the intent was for a long term residence.

The emphasis on long term, he explained, was because the tourism boom has driven up the number of vacation rentals in the country which has an effect on the housing market.

“If you intend to do a short term rental, then it would be disqualified because that’s a different set of concessions; that’s a different business model. We don’t want to encourage persons to build for condos or rental sales, and then that also goes into the short term market. That defeats the purpose because a part of our issue right now is a lot of people converted their long term homes or apartments to short term.”

This lowered the amount of available homes for long term occupation, exacerbating the housing shortage. Robinson said the concession which will be for those developing crown and private land for mixed use units, and single family homes will be officially introduced to the public next month.