Abstract

KING MANTILLA, Katiuska. Public banking, social security and access to house financing in Ecuador. Universitas [online]. 2019, n.31, pp.119-139. ISSN 1390-8634.  https://doi.org/10.17163/uni.n31.2019.06.

Social Security in Ecuador is not universal. The Ecuadorian Social Security Bank (Biess) was legally established in 2009, and began to operate formally one year later. The Biess uses social security resources to offer housing mortgages to its members: obtaining financial returns up to three percentage points higher, while at the same time offering more benefits to its affiliates. Loans are insured through income and asset guarantees. The policy boosted housing construction, increased liquidity in the real economy and reduced interest rates on housing loans by 2.2 percentage points, as direct provision by Biess produced more competition and social security affiliates were able transfer their privately financed mortgages to the Biess. House ownership among social security affiliates increased by almost four points between 2007 and 2018. The households who most changed their participation from owning their own homes were located in quintiles 2 and 3. The presence of the Biess and its portfolio purchases modified financial regulation in the housing sector. This article takes stock of the results of direct provision by means of a public operator as an alternative form of financial regulation and of interest rates in particular.

Keywords : Housing finance; social security; alternative financial regulation; finance; financial policy; economic policy; direct provision.

        · abstract in Spanish     · text in Spanish     · Spanish ( pdf )