Conventional building method can’t solve housing problem — Akintunde
The Managing Director, Alpha Mead Facilities, Mr. Femi Akintunde, has said that the conventional method of building will be inadequate to address the housing deficit in the country.
According to him, innovative solutions that save costs and deliver quality housing of international standards is the way out.
Akintunde spoke at the unveiling of the partnership between AM Facilities and Wall-Ties and Forms International, one of the world’s leading manufacturers and suppliers of modular building system.
He said work had commenced at AM Facilities’ Lekki Pearl, a 112-unit estate of four housing types, with WTF scheduled to provide the modular building system for the project.
He said, “Through the Lekki Pearl model, we are poised to close Nigeria’s housing gap further by reducing homeownership entry level from the current market average of N6m deposit through a unique offering.
“Our aim is to lower the entry level for homeownership to just guaranteed regular income from where the monthly instalment can be paid so as to help middle income Nigerians who are unable to raise large capitals to pay as deposit to developers or build for themselves, with the perennial challenges associated with building expertise and professionalism.”
Akintunde said if the homeownership entry level was left at the current N6m average, many Nigerians, especially the middle-income earners, would find it difficult to own a home.
He noted that the modular technology would ease the process of construction and drive down the cost of building by a very wide margin.
He added, “With the framework, the speed of construction is expected to increase to as much as delivering a house every week, post foundation. It is also worthy of note that each set of forms can be further re-used up to 1,000 times, and economy of scale behind this re-usability will in the long run further drive down the cost of building to the benefit of the market.
“We will be able to achieve this feat due to our method of construction, which is a cast-in-situ system that will allow us set up the panels along the mechanical and electrical services within days, using average of six personnel.”
According to him, with the technology, the entire construction process can be carried out within seven days and many units can be built concurrently using multiple numbers of forms.
“As Nigeria continues to seek alternative building solutions to address its widening housing shortage, there are possibilities that the new modular building system brings to the market in terms of cost effectiveness, efficiency, re-usability and of course, its environmental sensibility and friendliness,” Akintunde said.
The President, WTF, Mr. Ross Worley, said the technology was considerably better than the block structure and was for speedy construction.
“The technology is fast; this is something that will help Nigeria and it is a bold initiative,” he added.
The General Manager, Real Estate, AM Facilities, Mr. Damola Akindolire, said the aim was for the firm to become the largest provider of affordable houses by 2020.
PUNCH.
