An Ethiopian report says “Alarmed by the pace at which illegal construction is increasing in the capital, the care taker administration has established a task force to demolish some 20 thousand unlawfully constructed houses. It also intends to take legal measures against those who built them”

Where are the councils and authorities when people build these illegal homes?. In Nigeria an illegal 4 storey building collapsed ended up in a tragedy killing 25 people.

Share This

A new parliament building is on the cards to be build along Simon Mazorodze in the Kope Area. Its a massive project expected to start in October and finish in 2011. How do you think the building will look like. I have scoured for some different parliament buildings. the only thing is most parliament building are historic buildings and therefore they are old.

Here is what i have come up with

May be something like this Brazilian Parliament

Or this is Singapore Parliament

Or we could get ideas from our neighbours - South Africa

Share This

I was reading this articles about big firms helping employees buy homes. In my opinion that can only provide a minority of people with such help and i dont even think its a good idea after all. Remember companies are there to make profit. We should never forget that and all they do or invest on should provide them with a postive return. I will fisrt look at the financial institution like banks. Most of these used to provide decent mortgages to their employees and they would pay back the interest on a much lower interest rate. The reason they did it. It was because they were finacial intitution so it was there core business.

Share This

Unlike most countries who suffer from rural-urban migration, Zimbabwe is facing quite the opposite is Ruralisation whith more people moving out from the urban areas to rural areas because of the escalating cost of living in the urban areas.

Zimbabwe- what a unique country. I wrote about Harare being the second least expensive city yet the poor people of Zimbabwe cant even afford to live in what the world terms the least expensive city.

Share This

Do you think its time we also adopt the new enviromentally friendly houses in Zimbabwe. This report suggest a new alternative to cement, however i think we may need to move on from the idea of brick to some other alternative. I am not an eco warrior but I have been to places in Epworth where all thats left are deep gullies from people digging out sand. This is not sustainable in the long term. At present construction is very low due to high cost but i think the idea of buying a boxed home impresses me. You dont have to worry about the continuing high cost. I am not talking about the Kuwadzana type of prefab houses but there are some really good ones these days

Share This

This report says China proposes to limit real estate investment by foreigners. There are lessons to be learn when you have a booming economy reliant on foreign investment.

The truth is the Zimabwean market is still very much dorminated by locals, i have read a few articles in the UK where Zimbabwe is being featured as a hotspot to buy in. Even though we havent seen much of the foreign dollars, these reports suggest money can be made in this market.

Share This

The South African property market seems to be cooling off now.Growth in the number of residential units completed also went into negative territory in July last year, falling by 14,7%. I always wonder who buys some of the homes which are very expensive. Its not uncommon seeing homes over £1million ( sorry guys i am unable to conevrt this to zim $). The problem with SA is it just doesnt rely on its locally but on foreigners buying. Even though this may sound good news it prices the locals out of the market. A typical example is Capetown where prices are so high. In my honest opinion, i think overpriced in most cases. Our neighbours are relying on the world cup that it will bring them a windfall in more houses being snapped up.

Share This

This 4 story building in Nigeria collapsed on Tuesday night killing 25 people. This is sad reality of what happens when developers do shoddy work. The developer is now on the run. Occupants of the three other buildings constructed by the owner of the collapsed building, have started moving out of their apartments located at 42, 49 and 77 on Ibadan street, Ebute Me.

Its just amazing how a developer can build a shoddy 4 storey building. Apparently the building was approved as a 2 story building yet it stood as a 4 story building.

Share This

According to this report companies are being driven out of the CBD due to high rentals. Even though its true, Harare was recently rated second least expensive city to live in the world. I talked about this in my earlier report.

I think in terms of return on buy to let, you will get the least in Zimbabwe. Houses in areas like Avondale now cost around $25bn+ (£25 000) yet to rent it you can get around $120m (£120). The sums just dont add up. Believe it or not rentals in Zim are relatively low. Its just other factors like an high inflation which makes it very difficult to look at it that way

Share This

This is a joint venture by Phillip Chiyangwa, ZIMRE and CFI aimed to develop 1000 stands in Amalinda Road South of Glen View. Stands will measure between 275sqm and 2600. Its not known how much the stand will cost. I will update you once i find out how much they cost. Servicing of the stand will begin next month and in Zim its still very early days to release the amount because of inflation.

My concern with such projects is weather the developers will actually deliver. Its very common for developers to start such huge projects and dump them half way through because of escalating cost.

Share This