Hass Consult’s Head of Marketing and Research Sakina Hassanali during the release of the index. [PHOTO: WILBERFORCE OKWIRI/STANDARD]

By  LYDIA LIMBE

It is now possible to make real estate investment decisions at the click of a button, thanks to a new property app launched by Hass Consult Ltd last week.

‘My Hass Data’ is a ‘live’ property price research app that will allow users to research property prices by suburb, or even street, size of property, or type, as well as rate of sales and vacancies.

“We expect this to be a best-in-class tool for any organisation or individual needing market information, conceiving investment strategies, or researching development concepts,” Sakina Hassanali, Head of Marketing and Research at Hass Consult.

Nathan Luesby of Jenga Web, one of the consulting partners for this app, says that from the click of a button, one is able to know the number of properties on a street, the rental and sale prices, as well as upcoming approved construction projects.

Luesby said the app would allow users to build their own tailor-made real estate reports. Barely two weeks ago, CityMark, a web-based software being used in South Africa to provide local housing market information, was introduced in the country.

These developments come in the wake of a price drop in the property market. According to the latest Hass Consult Property Index released last week, asking prices for the third quarter of the year fell by 1.5 per cent.

Dropping prices

Asking prices for detached houses fell by 2.3 per cent between July and September, while apartments went down by 0.8 per cent. Semi-detached houses, however, saw an increase in asking price by 0.8 per cent. A jump in interest rates for mortgages played a role is slowing down the market. Mortgage rates have been static in the third quarter, averaging 16.96 per cent.

“The best offer in the market is the one from CfC Stanbic, which is lending at 13.5 per cent. Even with the entrance of the Ezesha loan from Housing Finance at 105 per cent financing, the cost of a home loan is still prohibitive to most,” said Caroline Kariuki, the Managing Director of The Mortgage Company.

Speaking at a joint Hass Consult and The Mortgage Company press conference, Kariuki said that only one fifth of the people living in urban areas are homeowners, while four fifths rent. In the rural areas, home ownership is at 70 per cent.

Many banks, save for CfC Stanbic, continue to demand a nine point margin (based on the Central Bank of Kenya’s base lending rate of 8.5 per cent).

Kariuki pointed out that in the last ten years, the number of employed people increased from 1.6 million to 2.2 million. During the same period, the number of Small and Medium Enterprises or self-employed people increased from 800,000 to 12 million people.

But when a self-employed person walks to a financier to seek a loan, getting a mortgage will be difficult.

She called for urgent attention to increase accessibility and eligibility for mortgages, if Kenya is to make headway in increasing homeownership for its citizens. Currently, there are only about 20,000 mortgage accounts against a population of 40 million people.

This is very low compared to other nations. The United Kingdom, for example, has 9.2 million mortgages which is about 3.2 per cent of households, while the United States of America has 44.5 million mortgages, representing 59.3 per cent of the total households. South Africa has residential mortgages of 56 per cent of its households.

Increased value

According to the Hass Consult Property Index, property values have increased by 3.4 times since the year 2000. The average value for property has gone up from 7.1 million in December 2000 to Sh24.4 million in September 2013. Currently, a four to six bedroom apartment is going for Sh34 million, while a one to three bedroom apartment averages Sh11 million.

In 2001, the property market was dominated by detached houses, which took up 52 per cent; 24.5 per cent was semi-detached houses; while 23.5 per cent was taken up by apartments.

The trend has changed since then, with apartment blocks dominating in 2013 at 40.1 per cent, followed by detached houses at 33.4 per cent, and 26.5 per cent for semi-detached houses.

Detached houses include standalone houses, bungalows, cottages and villas — either on their own plot or in a gated community. Values for this kind of property have increased from Sh8.8 million in December 2000 to Sh35.1 million in September 2013, while semi-detached houses are currently selling at Sh19.2 million, up from Sh6.5 million in December 2000.

Rents have also increased 3.04 times since 2001, with a 9.6 per cent growth last year alone. A four to six bedroom house is currently letting at Sh177,511, while rent for a one to three bedroom is Sh65,051.

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