Lagos receives over 1,577 real estate fraud petitions – Sanwo-Olu’s aide

 The Special Adviser to Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State on Housing, Barrister Barakat Odunuga-Bakare, has attributed the rising inflation in the country and the population as major factors affecting the delivery of massive housing schemes to residents in the state’s government’s drive to bridge the deficit.

Odunuga-Bakare, however, revealed that the agency has received over 1,577 petitions between 2020 till date.

This came as she said the state government will commence enforcement of the monthly house-renting policy by the end of the year or early next year, 2025.

Odunuga-Bakare, stated these while speaking with newsmen on her activities since the assumption of office and set goals for her office in 2024, held in in Alausa, Ikeja, Lagos.   

On inflation issues, she said, “This inflation issue is a global thing. It’s not just Nigeria alone and it affects everybody. The CBN is trying to come up with policies for dollar (rate) to regularise and not just keep going up at will.

“It’s a different amount in the morning and when checking back in the afternoon is different by the time you check back at night is different. But I can tell you that things will stabilize soon. The Lagos State government can not get involved and say this is not how much to sell property.

“We can’t do anything per se in that, it’s inflation that is affecting everybody and our contractors as well. When they get jobs and they don’t do it at the time when they are supposed to do it, people come back for variation and all sorts because of the way the dollar keeps going up and down.

“It’s something that we can’t intervene in. We just have to wait and let the economy stabilize on its own.

“Also, because, we have quite a lot of people migrating to Lagos every year and the statistics are rising. We have about 500,000 people migrating to Lagos every year.

“And that 500,000 are just the ones that we know, not the ones that enter through the back door. And the landmass that we have in the state is so small. I wouldn’t say it’s overpopulated yet, but it’s getting near overpopulated and we don’t really have enough to go around everybody.

“That’s why it is as if the government is not doing enough. We are doing this, but the population is more than what we are actually doing. So, at this point, we are working and trying to make sure that people have access to our facilities, that is, the homes that we sell, through the Ministry of Housing, because that is part of the Commissioner for Housing’s mandate.

“So, mine is just the regulatory part. So, I am trying so much to regulate the park, calling on brokers, developers, agents, and realtors to come and register, to sanitize that sector because it’s polluted with all sorts of.”

Speaking on the number of petitions relating to real estate fraud that the agency had handled so far, she said, “We have received well over 1.577 petitions, from the inception of this agency in 2020 to date.

“And we have been able to resolve 1,027, we have eight cases in court bordering around real estate frauds and what have you. We are not relenting in our commitment to getting justice to residents.”

Recall that her predecessor had mounted pressure on how to introduce monthly rents with a timeline for the commencement, which was scheduled for 2022 December but has not commenced implementation till date.  

Odunuga-Bakare said, “I spoke about this few days ago. Government is a continuum, if you don’t continue where you see progress that means you want to go like 52 years backward.

“We are trying to perfect one thing or the other. And besides, the administration was coming to an end as at then. But now we have a new administration and Mr. Governor wants to see the scheme fly.

“Anywhere in the world, rent is collected monthly, we are looking forward to it, and hopefully, by the end of the year or early next year, we will be able to implement that policy of monthly renting.

“And also, you will be charged according to your earnings. The good part of that is that we will be test-running the policy within the public sector, where we can ascertain how much everybody is earning. Once we see that it works in the public sector, we will push it to the private sector, that is the formal and then the informal sectors.”

Odunuga-Bakare, while responding to the effective mortgage policy on housing in advanced climes, added, “We are trying to perfect one thing or the other. And besides, the administration was coming to an end as at then.

“But now we have a new administration and Mr. Governor wants to see the scheme fly. It would come into effect by the end of this year or early last year.

“I have been selling it to the private sector that there is a mortgage system that works. They can partner with the government because the state cannot do it alone.  And it has to be collaborative efforts between the public sector, which is us, and the private sector too.

“We are calling on the public and the general populace that the Lagos State government is open to doing business with them. Also if you do so, it will bridge the housing deficit in the state.”