Lagos land transactions down by 30 per cent

This is not the best of times for Lagos government as the nation’s economic recession has impacted negatively on the State’s Lands Bureau by slowing down land transactions to a record low of 30 per cent.
 
Last year, the state authorities slashed various rates applicable to land transactions from 13 per cent to three per cent. For instance, consent fees was reduced from six per cent to 1.5 per cent while capital gains tax, previously two per cent , was reduced to 0.5 per cent.

The Permanent Secretary, Lagos state Lands Bureau, Bode Agoro, told media personnel that despite the cut in rates, there has been decline in governor’s consent, which used to be the highest revenue generating arm of the bureau.    

He stressed that the bureau is committed to the project by creating enabling environment where the land registry should be secured in order to vet and scrutinize all applications.
 
According to him, the process will involve the scanning of all the documents and when completed insurance companies will pay buyers the cost of that transactions just as it is done in market of shares. On the issue of land allocations, he said, the government is presently processing backlogs of allocations done by the past government as over 5, 000 C of Os have been issued by Governor Akinwunmi Ambode.
 
He said that the  bureau has adopted an electronic system to take care of double allocations as well as shortening by the process to get optimum  productivity.