After 30 Years, Marikina Families Finally Own Their Homes
For nearly three decades, 44 families in Barangay Malanday, Marikina City, lived on land they called home — but never legally owned. Not anymore.
The Social Housing Finance Corporation (SHFC) and the Department of Human Settlements and Urban Development (DHSUD) have officially awarded them Transfer Certificates of Title (TCTs), turning a generation-long wait into a permanent reality.
The title-awarding ceremony, held for members of the Samahang Magkakapitbahay ng Purok III Homeowners’ Association, Inc., Phase II-A, stands as one of the clearest wins yet in the government’s push to give informal settler families secure legal claim to the land beneath their homes.
A Decades-Old Dream Rooted in Marikina’s Relocation History
The community’s roots stretch back to the late 1990s, when it was formed as part of Marikina’s in-city relocation program — an effort to resettle families within the city rather than push them out to distant relocation sites. For years, residents built their lives, raised children and grew old on the land without any legal security of ownership.
That changed in 2019, when the association secured a land acquisition loan from SHFC through the agency’s Community Mortgage Program (CMP), one of the flagship initiatives under President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s Expanded Pambansang Pabahay Para sa Pilipino (4PH) Program. The CMP lets organized communities of informal settlers collectively purchase the land they occupy, clearing the path toward legal titling.
The 44 newly awarded titles cover a portion of the association’s 124 member-beneficiaries, with more families expected to receive their own TCTs as the program moves forward. Nearly half of the association’s members have already fully paid off their housing loans — a milestone SHFC officials call proof that community-driven, responsible homeownership works.
Officials Hail Milestone as Model for Housing Security Nationwide
The ceremony drew top government brass: DHSUD Secretary Jose Ramon Aliling, SHFC President and CEO Federico Laxa, DHSUD Senior Undersecretary Eduardo Robles Jr. and SHFC Executive Vice President Atty. Junefe Payot all showed up to mark the occasion — a clear signal of high-level support for the initiative.
Laxa called the event the fulfillment of a long-held dream, telling beneficiaries in Filipino that the titles now secure not just their homes, but their families’ future and the inheritance of generations to come.
HOA President Cristina Bautista echoed that sentiment, thanking SHFC for the lifelong security the titles now provide, one she said would be passed down to her grandchildren. Marikina First District Rep. Marcelino Teodoro also welcomed the milestone, saying it fulfilled a long-standing goal for his constituents to finally achieve secure homeownership.
For DHSUD and SHFC, the Marikina awarding is part of a broader campaign to bring land tenure security to Filipino families nationwide. It’s proof that with persistence, community organizing and government partnership, even a 30-year wait can end with a title deed in hand.
