Housing Market: Disease-Stricken Sector of Iranian Economy

Corruption is festering and gangrene has set in Iran’s housing market, which condition became symptomatic in the fiscal 2016-17, when the number of vacant homes exceeded two million and prices increased by 100%, Kamal Athari, an expert in urban economics and housing policy, told ILNA in an interview. A translation of his views is as follows:
The government’s approach in housing market is erroneous. Iran’s housing market has been suffering from its rentier, monopolistic system for 15 years now, triggered by the practice of issuing the so-called ‘holograms’ to contractors of urban projects as a way to settle municipality debts.
[The hologram system, a self-styled creation of former mayor and current parliament speaker, Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, who was in charge for 12 years, enabled the municipality to settle its mounting debts to contractors through a non-cash arrangement and at the same time generate income by selling holograms, which in turn were used by builders to pay their fines for illegal constructions to municipalities.]