The tax measures proposed in the anti-crisis plan, submitted by the Government to Congress, benefit buyers, sellers, and developers within the formal, financed market. The housing deficit of more than 1.4 million units, documented in official data, operates on a different scale
SANTO DOMINGO. – The housing-related measures included in the anti-crisis plan of June 11, 2026, by the Ministry of Finance and Economy do not reach those most in need of a roof over their heads in the Dominican Republic, even though the Ten-Year Housing Plan 2022-2032 of the Ministry of Housing and Buildings puts the housing deficit at more than 1.4 million units.
These are data from the ENHOGAR Survey, prepared with the technical collaboration of the Central Bank of the Dominican Republic, the National Statistics Office and the Ministry of Economy, Planning and Development.
73% of that deficit is qualitative in nature: families living in very low quality housing, built with deficient materials, without access to basic services or in overcrowded conditions.
Why the exclusion?
All the measures in the plan related to housing, the gradual repeal of the 2% mortgage tax, the reduction of the ISR on Capital Gains on the sale of real estate by individuals from 25% to 10%, the immediate elimination of the 1% for the incorporation of companies, the gradual repeal of the Selective Consumption Tax on life insurance and the reduction of the inheritance tax between parents and children during life from 25% to 3%, operate within the formal financed market.
Its beneficiary is someone who already has access to the banking system or is in a position to access it, so families with a qualitative housing deficit do not resolve their situation through bank mortgage credit.
Data from the Superintendency of Banks indicates that the mortgage portfolio closed 2025 at RD$443,170 million, with an annual growth of 13.2%, the highest rate among all financing segments, according to the Report on credit in the financial system.
As of the first quarter of 2026, the mortgage portfolio grew 11.4% year-on-year, within a system whose total assets reached RD$4.28 trillion, according to the quarterly performance report of the financial system of the same institution.
At the end of 2025 there were 2,618,955 individuals with active loans in the system, and that is the universe that the measures of the plan do reach.
Who wins?
Within that universe, the benefits are distributed at different points in the chain:
The buyer is the one who faces the most direct and immediate impact: the 2% mortgage registration fee, which according to the Internal Revenue Service's Help Community is charged on the total value of the loan and is not deductible from Income Tax, is paid at the time of closing, when the buyer has already committed the initial payment and assumed the legal expenses of the transaction.
Its gradual elimination reduces that burden at the point of greatest financial pressure in the buying process. The reduction of the capital gains tax from 25% to 10% provides an incentive for individual sellers to put properties on the market
The developer benefits at two points: in the constitution of the legal vehicle of the project, with the immediate elimination of the 1% for the constitution of companies, and in the investment phase, with the accelerated depreciation planned from 2027.
Furthermore, the Treasury document itself does not present these measures as social housing policy. Slide 24 of Minister Magín J. Díaz's official presentation places them within the section on economic growth and tax simplification, with the explicit justification that these are taxes that affect competitiveness and increase the cost of formalization.
Its stated objective is fiscal and business-related, not residential, so the gap between the market that the measures reach and the deficit that the official data reflects makes clear the limit of the scope of the proposal.
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