The Shortletification of Nigerian Real Estate: When Homes Become Hotels
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A real estate expert warns that the rapid conversion of Lagos homes into short-term rentals is shrinking the long-term housing supply, pushing up rents and pricing workers out of the city's commercial centres.
The rapid conversion of ordinary homes into short-term accommodation is quietly reshaping Lagos's residential landscape, with apartments across Victoria Island, Ikoyi, Lekki, Ajah and the Lekki-Epe corridor increasingly being transformed into hospitality assets, according to real estate expert Ruona Oghuvbu.
Investors who once targeted long-term tenants now compete for nightly bookings through digital accommodation platforms, attracted by the promise of significantly higher returns. Oghuvbu argues that while shortlets have created legitimate investment opportunities and supported tourism, their unchecked expansion is placing additional strain on an already fragile housing market.
As more apartments are removed from the long-term rental market, the supply of homes available to residents declines, leading to increased competition for fewer rental properties, rising rents and declining affordability. The author notes that Victoria Island and Ikoyi have already become inaccessible to many salaried employees, with similar pressures now emerging across Lekki and gradually extending towards Ajah.
Oghuvbu also observes that many shortlet operators are now facing challenges of their own, with hundreds of apartments competing for the same pool of guests, less predictable occupancy and rising operating costs from electricity generation, diesel, internet, cleaning, maintenance, platform commissions and property management fees.
The article calls on planning authorities to distinguish between developments originally approved for residential occupation and those designed for serviced accommodation, and to limit the proportion of apartments within residential developments that may be licensed as short-term rentals. It urges developers to build purpose-built rental housing, workforce accommodation, student residences and co-living communities, and to revisit payment structures, arguing that requiring one or two years' rent in advance places considerable financial pressure on households whose incomes are earned monthly.