2.

Industry Milestones

The real estate industry is a key driver of the Philippine economy, generating gross value added of over a
hundred billion Philippine pesos as of the second quarter of 2021.  The growing number of middle-class
people and the growing number of remittances from overseas Filipino workers have led to an increasing
amount of money going into real estate over the last few years.

Over the years, the Philippine housing market has been plagued by housing shortages, especially in
metropolitan areas. As with major cities in the Asia-Pacific region, the outflow of households from rural
areas has led to unprecedented demand for affordable housing. As a result, the demand for socialized,
low-cost housing among low-income households is increasing and constantly increasing. In addition, the
geographical location of the Philippines is susceptible to natural disasters, making the country's housing
situation even more difficult. This condition is further hampered by the long-term coronavirus (COVID-
19) pandemic that has caused uncertainty in the housing market. Most importantly, lockdown
restrictions have caused serious unemployment in the service sector, especially among public transport
drivers, and households can no longer afford to pay rent.
In order to solve the housing gap, government agencies and the private sector jointly passed a
resolution aimed at accelerating the inventory of idle government land and speeding up the
development and release of socialized housing for more and more irregular residents. Measures have
also been implemented to provide financial support to the unemployed during the pandemic.

Based on the unemployment rate of the Philippine Statistics Office with Reference No. 2021-446
released last November 4, 2021, The number of unemployed in the country increased from 3.88 million
in August 2021 to 4.25 million, and the unemployment rate was 8.9%. This is the highest unemployment
rate since January 2021. This shows that our economy is severely affected by this long-term epidemic.

Real Estate Activities was included in the top five sub sectors with the biggest drop in the number of
employed persons from August to September 2021 along with the following:
a. Agriculture and forestry (-862 thousand);
b. Manufacturing (-343 thousand);
c. Information and communication (-126 thousand);
d. Mining and Quarrying (-75 thousand); and
e. Real estate activities (-69 thousand).