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Firm advocates access to land, affordable housing

By Eniola Daniel
01 May 2023   |   4:00 am
A private developer has tasked the federal and state governments to improve access to land and increase affordable housing stocks in the country.

Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Gidi Real Estate Development Limited, Mr. Tobi Akerele

A private developer has tasked the federal and state governments to improve access to land and increase affordable housing stocks in the country.

The Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Gidi Real Estate Development Limited, Mr. Tobi Akerele, made the call during allocation of land to the first batch of subscribers in Epe Gardens Estate, Lagos.

He lamented that access to land has become too difficult for Nigerians and decried the challenge of getting a good title in Lagos.

According to him, the real estate sector is broad, but remains a less regulated sector, adding that one of the major issues facing the sector is the Omo Onile syndrome in Lagos and other parts of the country.

Akere said: “I think regulation needs to take place; we need to know who we are dealing with, who the government recognises as the authentic owner of the land we are getting. We can get to a land and three years later, a group came up to claim they own the land. So, a system should be put in place where we can go to the government and confirm the original owner of the land we want to acquire.

“Lagos should have passed the stage where anyone can show up on a land to attack people in the name of Omo-Onile because it doesn’t happen in any mega city in the world, where a regular guy come with a gun to send people out of the land they purchased and still come to collect money after we got allocation from the government.”

He added: “There are many factors that come with the housing deficit in Nigeria, so, over 20 million housing units need to be built in Nigeria to cut down the number of the deficit and Gidi want to build 4.1 million units in the next 10 years, so, if each real estate first provides 4.1 million, it will be reduced to the barest minimum; we don’t have to leave it for the government alone, it’s time for private sectors to come in and take care of their own people.

“The government also needs to go into joint venture with the private sectors; the government should make the land available while the private sector build on the land; it’s the amount spent on building a house that determines how much we will push it out, if the government reduces the cost, it will also reflect in the amount of money we spend. We must also start adopting monthly and weekly payment.”

On the firm’s contribution to the sector, he said: “We are helping people to scale through the first hurdle; we go extra miles to make it easy for people to acquire land, so, because we know that a lot of Nigerians can’t afford to pay N5 million at once, we give them payment plan of 12 or 24 months to make it very easy for them to be able to acquire it.

“We have gone further in the construction phase and we have birthed a new company called Gidi Civil Construction Limited and the plan is to help those who have acquired land from us to build; we did that because we want to build at a very affordable rate and at the same time, best quality. We are considering alternative means of buildings that is self sustaining; building don’t have to be with blocks, and with this, we will be able to bring down the cost of construction at the same time give the best value to our clients.

On the target market, he said: “Everyone is our target market but we are very interested in the young ones, so, we have a campaign called not too young to invest. No matter the age, as soon as one starts having access to fund, the person should start securing their future.”

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