LIVING to its promise to deliver brand new homes to Nigerians within 180 days and raise the bar of housing provision in Nigeria, a Lagos-based private developer, Gran Imperio Group has injected affordable, yet classy homes, fitted for young individuals and families.

Christened ‘EssentialHomes’, the product was designed in two, three and four bedroom exquisitely finished terraced bungalows, spiced with air conditioning, good quality finishes, adequate parking, private garden, astro turf football pitch, swimming pool and other recreational facilities.

Though pilot projects are currently ongoing in six strategic locations, 70 out of 100 units SouthPointe Estate, located on 2.69 hectares of land, within a sprawling city of Lafiaji, off Orchid Hotel road, Lekki, Lagos State, is already completed.  Others are five hectares SouthPoint II consisting of 40 units of one bedroom bungalow, 60 units of two bedroom bungalow, 48 units of three bedroom bungalow and 48 units of four bedroom bungalow and Lakeview Park II, which is located on almost two hectares of land having 62 of three bedroom and bedroom bungalows.
There is also a 1.9 hectares Golden Leaf Estate, which upon completion will accommodate 72 families, that will have 36 three and 36 four bedroom bungalows.  A 26.5 hectares of land has also been secured to construct 848 housing units consisting of 60, 288, 264, and 236 of one, two, three and four bedrooms in Y’hello Estate, on Lafiaji, Off Orchid Hotel Road, after 2nd toll gate, while a 90.4 hectares of land within Abraham Adesanya Estate on the Lekki corridor is planned to add 554 housing units to the nation’s housing stock.  It was designed to produce 110 units of one bedroom, 156 of two bedroom bungalows, 144 of 3 and 144 of four bedroom bungalows; it would be known as Grand Lake.  At Oworoshoki under Oworoshoki Redevelopment Scheme, 200 families would have opportunity to subscribe to any of the house types including 40, 60, 48 and 52 one, two, three and four bedroom apartments.

Infrastructures that come with the schemes are roads, walkways, streetlights, CCTV, purified water, central sewage system, 24-hour electricity supply.
Prices of the estate, said to be the cheapest in the country are put at N7,950,000, N11,950,000, N14,950,000 and N18,950,000 for one, two, three and four bedroom units at a goal, GIG, has put in place mortgage facilities with financial institutions like Imperial Homes Mortgage Bank, Aso Savings & Loans, Zenith Bank, FCMB among others.  In fact, Imperial Homes provides flexible mortgage options between 5 and 20 years.
At the moment, organised private sectors from all the blue chip companies that have come together under cooperatives and groups in order to take headlong the housing challenges for a lot of the employees are MTN Cooperative Society, Addax, BATN, MEMCOS, Airtel, Shell among others. Financial institutions backing the scheme are formerly GT Homes now Imperial Homes, Zenith, FCMB and Heritage.
Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Gran Imperio, Mr. Adeyeye Ogunwusi, said his passion to relief the burden of homelessness among middle-class level Nigerians was one of the reasons his company decided to undertake EssentialHomes, adding that his firm had been able to deliver the first phase, as promised within 100 days.
“We came out with the concept to simplify construction of residential homes in January, and physical work began on site in February and judging from the volume of enquiries we get on daily basis, I can say this product has been widely accepted in the market.”
Chief Operating Officer (COO), Dele Arowolo, said: “This is a flexible housing savings scheme for tenants of Essential Homes that are anticipating to buy their own property in the next two-three years. An initial deposit of 25 percent is required to key into the scheme. Once a subscriber makes up to 50 percent deposit, he or she can move in and continue saving for the house in form of rent monthly.”
He hinted that the rent accumulates until the payment for the house is completed; adding this also guarantees a five-seven percent rental yield to investors interested in buying our products while we provide potential tenants for their units.
All partners in attendance spoke glowingly about the project, saying they believed in the project that it would go a long way to reducing the nation’s housing deficit and at the same affordable.