Companies

SA investor to build estate in Kikuyu

A South African private equity (PE) firm is set to develop a Sh500 million residential estate in Kikuyu in a joint venture with local investors.

Johannesburg-based Phatisa and Nairobi’s Africa Reit are planning to build 66 apartments that will be sold for between Sh7.5 million and Sh8.5 million per unit.

The apartments will be built on a one-acre land in Kikuyu, on the Western outskirts of the capital Nairobi.

The partners have a 50 per cent stake each in the joint venture dubbed Westpoint Heights that marks Phatisa’s first real estate project in the country.

“Westpoint Heights is a high-density development in a desirable node,” Phatisa said in a statement.

“This investment adds good-quality middle income residential apartments to the Nairobi market.”

The project is the first venture in Kenya’s real estate market by the Pan African Housing Fund (PAHF), a multinational PE fund managed by Phatisa.

The fund raised $41.5 million (Sh3.6 billion) in December 2012 and launched operations in last year’s first quarter. It targets to raise a total of $100 million (Sh8.7 billion) to invest in middle class houses in East Africa, Zambia and Mozambique.

Phatisa becomes the latest institutional investor to venture into Kenya’s booming property market that has attracted a diverse group of developers.

Local and foreign insurers, pension schemes, investment firms, and high net worth individuals are investing billions of shillings to put up office blocks and residential units in Nairobi and other major towns.