ABSTRACT

This paper presents regulatory framework for relevant authorities in promoting the
challenges of letting semidetached hosing duplex, operation of rental housing.
Rental accommodation has been acknowledged as an alternative method to
addressing housing predicament in developing countries. The study was carried out
on semi-detached houses in Gwarimpa, Abuja. A mixed method cross-sectional
approach was used to gather both quantitative and qualitative data. According to
GSS (2010) the total population Gwarimpa is 1,468,609, however the research was
conducted at household level and out of a total population of 31,536 households 75
were randomly selected. Data were collected using questionnaires, key informant
interviews and secondary sources.. The researcher concluded that rental housing
has managed to address housing shortages in Gwarimpa. Besides, tenants in
Gwarimpa are visible to various encounters such as congestion, high delinquency
level with health complication. Therefore, the study recommends for the provision
of serviced plots or building sites by the government so as to reduce the cost of
Rental housing supply and hence subsidize rent for the middle and low income
earners who are always victims of higher housing deficits in Gwarimpa and the
country at large.
 CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Study

This has been a year unlike any other. With the fallout of COVID-19 still

having an impact, plus the uncertainty around Brexit, there has been a lot of

upheaval for businesses across all sectors and industries in the last 12

months.

One sector that’s had to make some adjustments in recent months is housing.

House moves were postponed at the start of lockdown and allowed once

again in nigeria. Since then, the market has picked up.

However, while 80% of letting professionals who responded to a recent

survey for Goodlord (2020) claim that they feel positive about the future of

the letting industry, almost half (47%) say that the impact of the pandemic is

still their biggest concern.

With this in mind, it seems that there are some challenges that the letting

industry faces right now.

Real estate experts observe that if the unoccupied houses in private housing

estates in Abuja are made accessible to Nigerians at affordable costs,

accommodation in the FCT will not be as difficult as it is presently.

They express concern about accommodation problems in the nation’s capital

city, citing a recent statement made by  Bala Mohammed, the Minister of

FCT that the Abuja alone accounted for 10 per cent of the 17 million

housing deficit in the country.

The minister had said at the inauguration of a 49-luxury apartment in Apo-

Dutse Housing Estate, Abuja, that: “From statistics, the housing deficit in

Nigeria is about 17 million and 10 per cent of it is in the FCT.’’

With this situation, stakeholders in the housing sector opine that it is not

wise for estate developers to construct houses and lock them up until buyers

offer them the exorbitant amount of money they require for rents or sales of

such houses.

They argue that if the owners of such houses were a bit flexible with their

terms, the high cost of rent would have been reduced in Abuja.

Unarguably, many of the private housing estates in the FCT have remained

unoccupied years after they have been completed by their owners.

In spite of numerous housing estates in various parts of the city, observers

put rents for a two-bedroom bungalow in Maitama, Asokoro, Wuse and

Garki at between N2.5 million and N3 million per annum.

They also put the cost of the same apartment in the satellite towns of the

FCT such as Kubwa, Lugbe and Karu, among others, at between N800, 000

and N1.2 million per annum in private housing estates.

Observers, therefore, note that the high cost of renting houses in the FCT,

mostly populated civil servants, is a threat to the well being of the residents.

They argue that the residents have on many occasions, drawn the attention of

the government to the activities of private estate developers in that regard,

soliciting pragmatic approaches to accommodation problems.

Reiterating the observers view point, Mr Donald Ugo, a resident and civil

servant, advised the government to make it easier for civil servants to access

land and build their own houses.

“This is the only and surest way of making houses available and affordable

to low income earners in the FCT and other major cities in the country.

“Houses that have been left unoccupied for six months should also be

confiscated by the authorities and auctioned to civil servants who need

them,” Ugo said.

He urged the government to regulate the prices of houses and establish

appropriate rent tribunals to check the activities of shylock landlords,

particularly in the FCT.

Sharing similar sentiments, Maduka Maduabueze, a civil servant, urged

the Federal Government to restructure the mortgage institution framework in

a way that it would take the interest of civil servants into cognizance.

“There should be a scheme where civil servants, especially those working in

the FCT, are allocated plots of land and asked to develop same within a time

frame,’’ he said.

Emma Akeem, a resident of the FCT, rather advised the Federal

Government to construct affordable housing estates in different parts of the

country such as it did in the 80s so that the average Nigerian could have

access to decent accommodation.

“What private estate developers are doing is to create a class problem in the

FCT where only the wealthy can own and live in descent homes.

“I foresee a crash in the estate market, especially in the FCT, because the

income of most Nigerians is not enough to enable them to purchase these

houses,’’ Akeem said.

These sentiments, perhaps, motivate the Federal Capital Territory

Administration (FCTA) to put up measures at checking the activities of

owners of unoccupied housing estates in the FCT.

Dominic Odenigbo, the Head of Aesthetics and Amenities, Department of

Development Control of the FCTA, said the government would soon give
directives to make leaving housing estates unoccupied for more than six

months an offence in the FCT.

“Part of our condition for granting building approval is that construction

should begin within six months of such approval and that it should be

completed two years after.

“However, we have observed that many of the houses in the city, with a

large number of them in mass housing estates; have not been occupied many

years after construction, which is not acceptable.

“To stop this trend, we plan to include a clause in the approval that would

compel builders to rent out such houses not later than six months after

completion,’’ he said.

But some real estate developers insisted that they could not take the blame

for accommodation problems in the FCT.

They said that housing deficit in the country was due to high cost of land

and cumbersome mortgage loan processes in the country.

Benjamin Onuaku, the Marketing Executive, Netconctruct, an estate

developer in Abuja, noted that the housing deficit had persisted because

developers had no access to affordable lands.

He said cumbersome mortgage loan processes had not been favourable to

workers who were interested in buying houses.

“The experience has been that when civil servants indicate interest to buy

houses, the long period it takes to secure mortgage loans denies them the

opportunity of buying such houses.

“When people who have available cash come to buy the same houses, they

are sold to them immediately because the developers have to dispose of the

houses,’’ he said.

Onuaku said a clause in the mortgage loan process such as the equity

contributions, was a major obstacle for low income earners in accessing

funds.

He, therefore, urged the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria to ease the

processes of securing mortgage loans by the beneficiaries of the National

Housing Fund.

He also observed that some houses in the FCT were locked by buyers who

might not be ready to occupy them immediately.

“House owners put high price tags on their houses because of the initial cost

of purchase and high cost of building materials.

“The houses are not occupied because the owners cannot rent them out at a

loss,’’ he said.
In the light of this view, Ahmed Usman, the spokesman for Global Assets

Company Ltd, an estate developer, solicited greater collaboration between

real estate developers and appropriate authorities in housing sector.

“If lands can be allocated directly to developers by the relevant authorities,

the cost of houses will be reduced to enable both the high income and low

income earners to buy them,’’ he said.

Observers note that efforts at making land allocation accessible could have

stimulated the recent decision of the Minister of Housing, Lands and Urban

Development, Akon Eyakenyi, to inaugurate committees to address the

challenges of land allocation.

The committees are Verification and Auditing of Federal Government Lands

and Landed Property in the 36 States of the Federation and the FCT;

Presidential Initiative on the Delivery of 10,000 Housing Units under the

Nigerian Mortgage Refinance Company and a committee on National

Housing Survey.

The minister urged the committee to undertake comprehensive inventory and

audit of Federal Government lands and landed property in all the states and

the FCT.
 She also directed the committee on National Housing Survey to ascertain the

characteristics of the various housing estates developed by the ministry,

Federal Housing Authority and the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria.

According to her, the committee will also ascertain the characteristics of

houses developed by the Real Estate Development Association in the last

four years.

Eyakenyi urged the committees to undertake a national housing survey in

collaboration with all relevant stakeholders and recommend measures that

should be taken to solve accommodation problems in the country.

All in all, observers believe that if the relevant authorities make pragmatic

efforts at addressing housing deficit and they back them up with stronger

political will, the questions that why many housing estates remain

unoccupied in the FCT will not rise.

1.2 Statement of the Problem

One of the most important housing challenges in Nigeria and particularly

Abuja, is not the availability of housing but the inability of citizens to afford

the rent of the existing stock, especially in the Federal Capital City. The

extremely high cost of rent and service charges culminates into a low

occupancy rate for finished residential properties. Property owners create an

 artificial scarcity by continually increasing rent on empty completed

properties and on property developments not principally investment-driven.

The average price of semi-detached duplexes for rent in Gwarinpa, Abuja

is ₦3,250,000 per annum. The most expensive semi-detached duplex costs

₦6,000,000 per annum while the cheapest costs ₦800,000 per annum this

high letting price tend to create a problem for tenant and estate surveyors

and this challenges will be talked of in this project work

1.3 AIM

To examine the challenges of letting semidetached housing duplex in

Gwarinpa, Abuja.

1.4 OBJECTIVE

1. To identify the properties under redevelopment on the case study

2. To know the stage of the properties under development

3. To examine the prospect of the properties letting

4. To examine the challenge involve in the property leting

1.5 Research questions

 1. What are the properties under redevelopment on the case study ?

2. What are the stages of the properties under development?

3. What are the prospects of the properties letting in gwarimpa?

4. What are the challenges involve in the property letting?

1.6 Research Hypothesis

1.7 Significance of the study

The study entails some importance which building professional developers

and non professionals, but ideal with land and buildings.

This dissertation will be found useful to both private and public property

developer. even individuals who wish or intend to developer or develop their

obsolete properties (building ) will be exposed to the ways by which these

could be carried out financially, physically, politically, the study could so be

found useful to the properties investors as the redevelopment of a building

improves and increase the aesthetic and rental value of the building

respectively. as such more return or yield is realized.

1.8 Scope and Limitation of the study

 The projects take a look at an estate surveyors view on the challenges of

letting semidetached housing duplex in Gwarinpa, Abuja, Nigeria.

The research work is limited to Gwarimpa alone and not the entire Abuja

Insufficient time was another problem. The writer has to distribute the short

available time at his disposal to the pursuit of this project work and to other

academic pursuits.

During the collection of the data used for this project work, the researcher

was faced with the poor response of the few available people or property

owners interviewed thinking that the researcher may have be one of the

frauds in the town, thus preferred to keep their words to themselves.

Inadequate literatures on the topic has been of the problem faced as the

researcher could not lay his hand on one quick referencing, thus, making

him to rely exclusively on the data gotten from the field.

Another major problem was the unavailability of some property owners for

interview by the researcher.

1.9 Study Area

Gwarinpa is the last district in the Abuja Municipal Area Council and in the

phase 3 development plan of Abuja. It embodies the largest single housing

 estate in Nigeria, the Gwarinpa Housing Estate. The district was created

during the Abach regime and is said to be the largest of its kind in

Africa. There is also another residential area called Life-Camp in the

Gwarinpa district. Most Construction companies in Abuja have staff quarters

in Life-Camp.

Gwarinpa is mainly a residential area though recently some businesses

especially service oriented businesses like banks and eateries are springing

up very rapidly. Most of these businesses are located on the three major

roads in Gwarinpa. The roads are 1st avenue, 2nd avenue and 3rd

Avenue. Other estates in this districts include: Federal ministry of works

and housing Estate, War College Estate, FHA Estate, Citec villas, Abuja

Model City etc.

1.10 DEFINITION OF TERM

Some register words and terminologies in the content of the dissertation are

defined below:

Development: A process of adding improvement (building) to be prepares

by the sub-divider.
Redevelopment: A process where by old structure (building) are

demolished only to give way to replacement development. it is based on an

existing builder.

Residential: These are types of properties or building house constructed for

dwelling purposed, flats.

Property: It is referred to as the hand and its properties and the building on

the land.

Investment: The money that people or organization have put into a housing

business in order to se4t profit.

Demolish: To completely destroy a building another new house.

Yield: The amount of profit that some one set form business.

Rental value: Is the amount which a building will reasonably be let

annually is the open market.

Landed properties: Are the building affixed to land and the component of

the land like sea, minerals e.t.c