An analysis of the existing housing situation has revealed that there are several constraints facing the housing sector in Nigeria. These key constraints have been responsible for the imbalance in housing demand and supply. This article takes a critical look at the issues undermining the housing sector in Nigeria.

There are many issues hindering socio-economic development in Nigeria, one of such is the below-par performance of the housing sector in the country. It has become common knowledge that the country suffers from a housing deficit of over 17 million units. What are the factors responsible for the staggering figures?

Some of the critical issues which will need careful consideration and prioritisation in the formulation of a national housing policy are:

1. Unavailability of land for housing

The relatively small size of the land resource base coupled with its historical and current pattern of ownership presents a serious constraint to housing. At every focus group discussion held in the various communities, the high price of land was identified as one of the major constraint to housing production. Therefore, land availability problem appears to be critical and deserving of special consideration.

In particular, the various policy makers will need to address the challenge of improving the supply of affordable housing given a small finite land resource base. Consistent with the draft Land Use Policy, specific strategies and action plans relating to government’s acquisition of available lands within communities will need to be examined in order to create housing land banks and consequentially focus on the needs of their residents. The acquisition of lands within communities for residential purposes should also be viewed within the sociological context of maintaining the community’s cultural base

2. High cost of infrastructure

Another deterrent to housing production by both the private and public sectors is the high investment cost of land infrastructure,  particularly where the development is distant from existing infrastructure. The developer fully bears the high investment cost of provision of water and road infrastructure to a new site, without future benefits for connections made off these infrastructures to other sites by other individuals or developers. This high cost of infrastructure significantly influences the final price of the serviced land and ultimately, the cost of housing to the consumer.

Therefore, there is a need to firstly re-examine the high initial cost of land infrastructure, and secondly to develop a common approach for the provision of utilities to housing developments. The cost of infrastructure accounts for about 25–30 % of housing expenditures. It is a main factor in the delivery of inexpensive housing. Authority has ignored this area and developers now deliver same, thus increasing the cost of houses. This is obvious in many gated residential communities across the populace, where the contractor provides autonomous electrical energy, water treatment plant, sewage plants, access roads to the estate, etc.

3. Increasing rural-urban migration

Rural–urban drift has not only placed a significant strain on the supply of housing, but has also resulted in severe traffic management problems. Indeed, the expressed demand for multi-family (apartment) housing in major cities is significant. At the macroeconomic level, a major challenge is the need to promote economic development policies that will reduce the rate of urbanisation by providing more employment opportunities in rural areas.

4. Inadequate finance mechanisms for low-income housing

While a review of the housing credit sector indicates a reasonable supply of financial institutions, access by low-income households appears to be limited. In particular, households with poor income are usually excluded from the formal credit sector. This is partly due to inflexible eligibility criteria for borrowing which involve steady income streams and land security.

Due to this, appropriate mechanisms for financing low-income households must be leveraged, with particular emphasis on more realistic eligibility criteria and lower interest rates.

Additionally, the institutional mechanism for administering low-interest finance to low-income households should be revisited. Given the fact that housing is one of the key basic human rights, attention is required with respect to the housing needs of the most vulnerable. While some housing assistance is provided through the government housing incentives, the mechanism for accessing these incentives remains largely unstructured. As a result, the benefits could be unintentionally diverted to higher-income groups.

It is important that clear incentive regimes be developed to specifically target low-income households. In that regard, there is a need for strategies and action plans to gather information on the socio-economic characteristics and geographic distribution of the poorest income quintile.

5. Cumbersome regulatory approval process

The lengthy and complicated regulatory approval process hinders efficiency within the housing delivery system. While certain measures instituted by the government are necessary, they tend to lengthen the regulatory process for obtaining planning approvals for land sub-division. In particular, the extensive delay caused by government referral agencies with respect to planning approvals has serious cost implications for private developers and ultimately, adversely affects in the final price to housing consumers.

6. Inadequacy of housing information system

The deficiency of information, which has also been expressed on several previous occasions, is cause for deep concern since the formulation of any successful housing policy must be based on a reliable housing information system. Therefore, it is essential that financial and human resources be allocated to facilitate the development of a comprehensive, accessible up-to-date and transparent database on the housing market. Moreover, a database with qualitative and quantitative information on housing will also serve to measure the performance of the National Housing Policy (NHP) against established targets.

Challenges of housing in terms of quality and quantity appear to be the same all over the world. The needy have less access to housing while the less needy have greater chances of accessing housing. In Nigeria, housing is generally inadequate in the rural areas in terms of quality, while the major problem in urban areas is more of quantity, although quality is also an issue. The shortage of housing is one of the factors responsible for the poor environmental quality across Nigeria. In 1991, the national housing policy was promulgated in order to propose possible solutions to the housing problems in Nigeria. Twenty four years on, millions of Nigerians are still homeless while many others are living in indecent houses.

A Policy is a deliberate system of principles to guide decisions and achieve rational outcomes. It is a statement of intent, and is implemented as a procedure or protocol. Policies are generally adopted by the board of or senior governance body within an organisation whereas procedures or protocols would be developed and adopted by senior executive officers. Policies can assist in both subjective and objective decision making. A policy is therefore a guide line provided by the government which is aimed at meeting the people’s housing needs through a set of appropriate strategies, which involves fiscal, institutional, legal and regulatory framework.

Housing policy on the other hand may be defined as government action to achieve housing objectives. These objectives could include the improvement of the quality of the housing stock of dwellings or dealing with homelessness. Another definition of housing policy would be government intervention in the housing field. The difference is that some interventions in the housing field may be directed at objectives outside the field. Examples could be the regulation of housing finance markets to influence activity in the national economy or restrictions on the amount paid in subsidy to low-income households to encourage incentives to work. Research shows that increasingly more housing policy is directed at economic objectives of efficiency in the national economy with the result that housing policy is increasingly becoming intervention in the housing field to achieve economic objectives

The major thrust of housing policy is to achieve some housing goals which universally manifest as to adequately house everybody in any given country in a good housing located in a good environment and at an affordable cost. Housing policies and housing programmes go in pari-passu  as one is dependent upon the other; housing policy is to achieve a housing goal which is realizable through housing programmes. Housing is recognized world-wide as one of the basic necessities of life and a pre-requisite to survival of man.

While a house is a place which provides shelter, refuge, comfort, security, and dignity, it has fallen short of these in recent time and appears to be a mere definition. A house also provides the physical framework in which human, social, economic, and cultural resources are realized, enriched, and integrated.

In the traditional African setting, in particular, housing is, in fact, one of the greatly cherished material properties. This is because of the other functions that a house performs in the traditional society which includes the protection of family cohesion and values, taking care of the aged through the extended family system, and the protection of the ancestral values, among others.

Thus, the importance of providing adequate housing in any country cannot be overemphasized. In fact, the housing industry can be a stimulus to national economy

Nigeria National Housing Policy defines Housing as the process providing functional shelter in a proper setting in a neighbourhood supported by sustainable maintenance of the built environment for the day to day living and activities of individual and families within the communities.

The challenges of housing policies particularly in the developing countries for quite some time now has to do with the minimum shelter requirement which is to be met at an affordable price to the majority of the citizens. The inability of earlier policies and programmes to adequately resolve the backlog of housing problems in the country reveals the need for more pragmatic solutions and this formed the basis for a review of the 1991 National Housing Policy.

Given the importance of housing in the national economy, the federal government of Nigeria set up a 15 man committee on urban development and housing in 2001. One of the responsibilities of the committee was to articulate a new housing policy. The report of the committee as accepted by the federal government was published in government white paper on the report of the presidential committee on urban development and housing in the year 2002. This led to a new housing policy, which was subsequently published as draft national housing policy in January, 2004. The draft policy was subjected to critical comments and inputs across the different states of the federation and the New National Housing Policy published in the year 2006.

This policy came up with some transitionary strategies in which government made significant effort in partial disengagement into housing provision and encourage privately developed housing. Under the policy adjustment such as the amortization period which was 25years under the previous policy was jacked up to 30years, interest on NHF loans to PMI’s were scaled down from 5% to 4% while the lending rate to contributors was reduced to 6% from previous 9%. The new policy was aimed at removing the impediments to the realization of housing goal of the nation. The goal of the policy was to ensure that Nigerians own or have access to decent, safe and healthy housing and accommodation at affordable cost.

This goal is similar to that of the 1991 policy except that the fulfillment of the policy is not tied to a specific period. The scope of the policy objectives has also been widened to include some of the issues put under the 1991 policy strategies.

However the Housing sector is yet to weather the seemingly insurmountable storm that has plagued it for donkey years.

Is there light at the end of the tunnel yet?

It is common knowledge that the average Nigerian presently lives in abject poverty, though the ruling class pretend not to be aware. Sadly, poverty and poor housing have direct bloodlines. This article analyses poor housing delivery in Nigeria.

A huge percentage of our populace live in inadequate or inappropriate housing, or worse still totally homeless, especially in urban cities. In spite of the various government policies, the country continues to have a good number of her citizens roaming on our vast land with no place to call home. Some can even be found in the unpopular Sambisa forest living like wild animals, yet depriving young girls who once had a roof over their heads, shelter.

On the supply side, various government policies in the past have been formulated towards overcoming the huge shortage through several Housing Reform Programmes. Despite these past efforts, housing continues to be a mirage to the ordinary Nigerian.

What are the problems hindering the delivery of housing in Nigeria?

It becomes pertinent that ‘The Government of the day’ through the Ministry of Powers, Works and Housing take time out to identify the various causes of housing delivery problems, examine different housing policies over the years, and suggest ways out for sustainable housing delivery.

Housing is a critical component in the social and economic fabric of any country. Housing represents one of the most basic human needs. To most groups housing means shelter but to others it means more as it serves as one of the best indicators of a person’s standard of living and his or her place in the society.

It is a priority for the attainment of living standard and it is important to both rural and urban areas. These attributes make demand for housing endless. As population growth and urbanization continue to increase very rapidly, so does the gap between housing need and supply widen.

Cultural factors such as preferences and values or social status, taste and financial resources, also influence a house physical characteristics. In developing countries, poor housing delivery has been attributed to inadequate mechanisms and systems for land allocation, funding, mortgage institutions and infrastructure.

It is quite unfortunate that adequate housing supply continues to elude people in the lower cadre of the society. The situation is very particular to most developing countries where population grow at exponential rate and rapid urbanization becoming a norm, while discrepancy in housing need and supply is high. The need for housing in Nigeria is enormous, in view of the 17 million units housing deficit, hence, various authorities have proffered strategies for improving housing delivery in Nigeria. But it’s the same old game; all talk, no action.

In as much as various policies have been put in place by the Nigerian Government from time immemorial to counter the problem of housing delivery, it hasn’t gotten any better. The shortcomings of these policies have made any breakthrough almost impossible.

In order to increase housing stock in Nigeria, there is the need to incorporate affordable housing delivery scheme into the formulation and implementation of housing policies and programmes which should not be at the exclusive preserve of Federal government, at the exclusion of government at local government level.

There is a need now to reach out and effectively involve the people and government at grassroot levels in the formulation of housing policies.

The Federal government has been directly involved in the construction of buildings for all categories in the past and even presently. It is now necessary that housing must be considered as a personal service and as such, the primary responsibility of housing should not be left with the people themselves who, however, should be assisted in some ways in order to realize their aspirations for self- actualization of owning individual houses.