Regulatory Reform in Nigeria's Real Estate Will Boost Transparency, Attract Investments – Adeosun

Mayowa Adeosun, founder and CEO of proptech and digital capital-market infrastructure startup Assetrica, says the biggest governance gap in Nigeria's real estate market is the absence of a defined licensing perimeter for who can develop, sell and market housing at scale. He spoke in an interview with BusinessDay about the Federal Government's proposed regulatory framework for the built environment.

Adeosun said real estate contributes about 13.4 percent of GDP and, combined with construction, exceeded N77 trillion in output in 2025, yet remains one of the few sectors of that size operating without a comprehensive regulator. He identified licensing, escrow, quality assurance and professional registration as the load-bearing elements of the proposed framework, arguing that consumer protection in real estate must be architected as a full system rather than assembled from isolated fixes.

On investor confidence, Adeosun called for mandatory audited financial reporting for developers above a defined transaction threshold, standardised disclosure requirements for off-plan sales, and a beneficial-ownership register for entities holding development approvals. "Capital does not move confidently in the dark," he said, noting that institutional allocators cannot underwrite Nigerian real estate without reliable transaction data, absorption rates, vacancy figures and price indices.

Adeosun said Nigeria's housing deficit was settled at 14.925 million units by the National Housing Data Technical Committee in January 2026, and that pension assets stood at N31.48 trillion as of July 2026, with alternative exposure to real estate in the low single digits. He put the mortgage-to-GDP ratio at about 0.5 percent and said governance reform, rather than a shortage of capital, is what would make institutional money deployable into housing.

Asked which single reform would have the greatest immediate impact, Adeosun named a functioning, publicly accessible developer licensing registry, arguing that escrow, disclosure, quality assurance and professional registration all depend on knowing who the licensed counterparties are. He also proposed standing up the new regulator with real authority and a funded budget, completing the developer registry, and running the escrow regime through a pilot in one or two states before national rollout.

Adeosun said that if the reforms are properly implemented, developer licensing could consolidate the market around credible operators within five years, escrow could become the default on off-plan sales, and institutional allocation to real estate could move materially above current levels, lifting the mortgage-to-GDP ratio toward levels seen in comparable African markets.