Shelter Afrique CEO calls for shift to mass housing

Pan African housing lender Shelter Afrique has challenged realtors to concentrate on mass housing projects across Kenya to address the deficit in urban areas.

Shelter Afrique chief executive Andrew Chimphondah said local developers should shun their appetite for high-end clients in favour of low cost housing that will improve quality of living spaces for most Kenyan families.

“Most developers tend to add higher margins to the units they develop, which in the long-run make such units rather expensive and out of reach for low income earners. This partly explains why there is a glut in the high-end property market despite the reported housing shortage in Kenya,” said CEO Chimphondah.

Shelter Afrique said while land contributed about 40 percent to the total construction costs, developers stand to benefit by taking part in the government-fronted Affordable Housing Programme (AHP).

Some 7,000 acres have been identified and assigned to AHP projects across the 47 counties where private developers have been invited to inject capital, develop the properties and be paid besides allocation of 30 percent share of the land for their own use.