500 Homes Rising on Land Once Trujillo's, N.Y. Times
Montgomery, Paul L.
SANTO DOMINGO, Domi- nican Republic-One sunny Saturday morning recently, a cloud of 200 squatters carry- ing housenol goods and old lumber descended on the Los Prados housing project on the flat...
...In another hour, James R. Miller, a bulky, tact-n engineer rrom Columbus, Ohio, who manages the de- velopment, had everything straightened out, and the squatters werc straggling along the highway looking for another home...
...n all, about $1-million in private capital has been raised - 60 per cent from American and 40 per cent from Dominican sources...
...With American and -Dominican caa...
...The Los Prados project is unique in the Dominican Re- public...
...4.5-m - lion in mortgage money from the Chase Manhattan Bank guaranteed by the Alliance for Progress, and years of hard work, the development has taken shape, and now it is one of the few outlets for the aspirations of the slowly emerging middle class...
...What makes the pr'ojeettinique is the mortgage money provided through the Chase Manhattan and the Alliceor Progress the United States aid program n Latin Amerlca...
...Miller, a 40-year-old graduate of Ohio State University who has worked as a builder and hous ing consultant in many coun tries, put up some money, as did the architectural firm of Tibbals, Crumley & Musson in C(num us...
...SANTO DOMINGO, Domi- nican Republic-One sunny Saturday morning recently, a cloud of 200 squatters carry- ing housenol goods and old lumber descended on the Los Prados housing project on the flat outskirts of this capital...
...Thus was another crisis passed in the $6.4-million de- velopment, which has come through seven changes of government an-d one revolu- tion since its inception in June, 1962...
...Within a half-hour, the ragged men, women and chil- dren had marked out family areas with stakes and ropes in a vacant field next to the middle-iniome develop- ment and were setting up light housekeeping...
...under tne mortgage financing, a home buyer gets a 20-year contract at an 8 per cent net interest rate after making a 15 per cent down payment...
...Sure, you get some unusual things doing business down here," Mr...
...More than 200 three-bed- room homes in ie$T U 9 O - t' $11,000 class are nm sned, and 300 more are scheduled for completion by the end of this year...
...The average income of the home -buyimn ama ear...
...The rows of well kept-up houses carpe ta field where children play amon gthe palm trees and is all but indistinguishable from a development in Lake Worth, Fla., or Phoenix, Ariz...
...The field used to belong to the Trujillo family...
...The Investment and DevelopenF-Comanv Ite( lto tt onsorng concern, egan as a private enterprise...
...Miller says, "but that's the way business is done...
...What the hell, I've been through more revolutions than most people have heard about...
...4...
...er is a 400 minimum e ellie.1 Long - term mortgages are rare in the Dominican Republic, and when they are available the net interest rate ranges between 12 and 20 per cent...
Vol. 1 • February 1967 • No. 1
