Developer targets lower middle-class with Sh2.5m houses in Ruiru

A Mombasa-based low-cost real estate firm has broken ground for a Sh100 million housing project in Nairobi area that will sell for Sh2.5 million a unit.

Kenya Projects Ltd is putting up 50 two-bedroom semi-detached maisonettes in Ruiru, its first project in Nairobi Metropolitan.

Budget houses

Dubbed ‘budget homes,’ the developer says its houses come with red-oxide floors as opposed to tiles, without kitchen fittings and wardrobes, shared walls and Orientile roofing sheets, making them cheaper than conventional houses.

“Our target market is the lower-middle class. Our market research showed that the units currently in the market are not affordable to this group,” said Antony Murithi Nkatha, the projects adviser.

“We moved to Nairobi because a majority of those buying our projects in Mombasa were from upcountry and were demanding budget houses,” he said.

Kenya Projects Ltd, established in 2002, is the real-estate investment arm of Coast Project Sacco, a credit union catering for Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) pensioners.

The real estate company is run by Mombasa-based businessman David Kanyi.

The Ruiru maisonettes have a plinth size of 900 square feet on two floors, and a car park and small backside garden measuring 15 by 10 feet.

March 2017

Kenya’s housing deficit grows at the rate of 200,000 units a year, chiefly because of a demand and supply mismatch as those at the base of the pyramid cannot afford to buy houses or access mortgages according to findings of the 2012/2013 Kenya National Housing Survey.

The Ruiru project — located near Kamakis, about two kilometres off the Eastern Bypass — is scheduled to be complete by March next year.