Developers have canvassed improved regulations in the housing sector to increase citizens’ access to land.
They made this call during an interaction with journalists after a Real Estate/Housing Reporters’ Workshop held recently in Abuja.
The event was themed “Promoting Real Estate Investment through Informed Media Alliance and Sustained Professionalism”.
The Managing Director of Leisure Court Estate Limited, Segun Abolaji, urged the government to make land affordable by regulating the ownership of land.
“There is no regulation for real estate in Nigeria, unlike in America, where possession of land is regulated. It is even more difficult for real estate people to apply for land and get direct allocations than the politicians who are not pressed to sell the land because they do not need the money and resell at exorbitant prices to real estate practitioners.
“Another factor why affordable houses cannot be realistic is because of the cost of cement and building materials. Only Gipson is sourced outside the country yet the cost of building materials is skyrocketing,” he noted.
He called on the government to regulate the possession of land to make affordable housing feasible, adding that the feasibility of affordable housing lied in the lower costs of cement and building materials.
He added, “The government must make land affordable by regulating the ownership of land to achieve affordable housing. In addition, the Nigerian attitude to make more profit inflames the problem. People take undue advantage of every situation making the business challenging for the practitioners, because it all adds to make housing costly.”