Observer West senior reporter – MONTEGO BAY, St James – Seal Construction Company Limited last Friday broke ground for a $1.7 billion housing development in Porto Bello, St James that will see the construction of roughly 450 houses over the next two years.

“Porto Bello Estates, as we call this development, is being developed on 70 acres and there will be space for a green area, two churches, a community centre, a commercial centre and a police post,” said Robert Thomas, a director of the company.

According to Thomas, the project is being executed in three phases and the first phase will include 96 two- bedroom units.

“The entire development is really a ‘mixed development’. It should have 69 service lots, 100 starter homes– which we call super studios– and the rest will be two bedroom units,” he explained.

The ‘super studios’ are priced at $3.7 million, while the 860 square feet 2 bedroom units will be sold for $6.5 million.

A model two- bedroom unit, the project manager Fitzroy Donaldson said, should be ready within the next two months.

Water and Housing Minister Dr Horace Chang in commending Seal for undertaking the project, noted that the development will make a worthwhile contribution to the housing stock in St James.

“The venture here today shows that the company has taken on an initiative to produce homes that are affordable and will greatly assist the working class,” Chang told the gathering.

He said ‘ indications’ are that the country is short of 3,000 houses per year, particularly at the lower end of the scale where the workers are earning from the minimum wage to $15,000 per week.

“These are the people that (we were not) able to get to and on many occasions they are the ones that end up squatting,” Chang said.

Seal Construction Company Limited was established in 1994 and has undertaken a number of projects across the island.

These include the Lagoons in Montego Bay, Counter Point development in Ironshore and Sterling Manor Town houses, Thomas told the Observer West.