Luxury real estate market attracts N24bn fresh FDI

Growing investor confidence in the Nigerian economy has continued to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) in the real estate sector, riding on the back of a combination of factors including the country’s demographics, emerging middle class with strong spending power and, lately, the rebased Gross Domestic Product (GDP) which shows a GDP size of $510 billion.

Recently, a whopping N24 billion FDI came into the luxury end of the real estate market for the development of a 750-unit high-end housing estate called RivTaf Golf Estate in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, which will deliver luxury villas or duplexes, town houses and luxury two- and three-bedroom apartments.

“My confidence in the Nigerian market is simply because there is demand, and if we could build 600 housing units at Brufut Garden for a population of 1.5 million people in The Gambia, 750 housing units for Nigeria’s over 160 million people is just a scratch on the surface,” said the investor, Mustapha Njie, a real estate developer from The Gambia.

”Nigeria’s new GDP size coupled with its large and growing population of over 160 million people are enough attraction for any savvy investor to bring investment into the country,” he said.

It is noteworthy that the rebasing of Nigeria’s GDP has exposed much more opportunities in real estate and infrastructure investment than had been previously imagined by both investors and analysts. This rebasing effort by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) shows that the country’s economy is now more diversified, with activities in the services sector overtaking those of agriculture and industry.

The implication of this to the real estate sector, analysts say, is increased opportunities as increased activities in the service sector, including wholesale and retail trade, human health and social services, information and communication, as well as professional, scientific and technical services, mean more investment in real estate space and infrastructure.

“We have come to a stage where we should be talking about Africa taking the lead in investment,” Njie said, pointing out that Nigeria’s new GDP size meant that the country would be having many foreign elements getting interested in its economy.

In an earlier report, BusinessDay had quoted Obi Nwogugu, head, real estate unit, African Capital Alliance, as saying there would be increased potential and opportunities in the economy as a result of the rebasing exercise, adding that more people would be looking to invest in the Nigerian economy.

Njie told BusinessDay in an interview that RivTaf Golf Estate – which sits on 38 hectares of land along Peter Odili Road, Trans Amadi, Port Harcourt, and is estimated to cost N24 billion to build – is a joint venture project between the Rivers State government and Taf Nigeria Homes Limited.

“The composition of the project is 608 apartments comprising two and three bedrooms; 31 villas comprising four and five bedrooms; 52 town houses which are all four bedrooms. We also have a golf course where we are building 128 luxury villas comprising four and five bedrooms,” he said.

On the project itself, he said the high point of what they were doing in Port Harcourt was that every aspect of the construction work would be done by Nigerians.

“The first thing we did when we came in was to look at the environment. In Gambia, we used Chinese contractors, but here we decided to do the work with the locals. We removed all the traditional bottlenecks in construction and gave them advance payment, and as a hands-on person, I am on site every day. I am proud to say that we started with eight Nigerian contractors but today we have over 25. What we have paid to contractors so far is over N5 billion,” he said.

In terms of job creation, Njie said they had created jobs for over 2,000 direct labour, exclusive of food vendors and materials suppliers. He further explained that they had engaged the community in whatever they could do so as to enable them benefit from the project, making them to see the project as their own.

Chuka Uroko