The collapse of a seven-storey building still under construction in Banana Island in Lagos Wednesday afternoon has sent the tongue wagging among experts in the real estate sector who wonder if anywhere still remains safe from building failures in Nigeria.
Though the incident, which occurred at First Avenue in the exclusive Island settlement, has no record of casualties, reports have it that many people (construction workers) sustained various degrees of injuries.
According to the experts who spoke to BusinessDay in reaction to the unfortunate incident, nowhere was safe anymore in Lagos if a building could collapse in Banana Island, the most exclusive destination in in Lagos, if not the whole of Nigeria today.
“This is one incident too many. When a 21-storey building being developed by Femi Osibona’s Fourscore Heights Limited collapsed in Ikoyi, killing over 40 persons, we thought we had seen the last of such high profile structure in a highbrow location falling like a pack of cards,” Johhson Chukwuma, a civil engineer, said.
Chukwuma wondered how a building in Banana Island, of all places, could collapse at the point of casting the seventh floor. “Not the Banana Island that we all know. It is incredible,” he lamented.
Continuing, he said, “nobody knows the cause of the collapse yet as the Lagos State government says they will commence investigation into the cause of the incident shortly, but if we go for the usual suspect which is human error, it beats the imagination that such can happen in Banana Island.”
This curved island that has the shape of a real banana, he explained, is the most expensive location in Lagos where buyers pay premium prices to own properties, whether it is land or houses, adding that both rental and capital values rise here almost on annual basis.
Read also: Seven-storey building collapses in Banana Island, Lagos
Chudi Ubosi, an estate surveyor and valuer, corroborated this view, saying, “the island is over 50 percent developed; if you are driving in, it looks undeveloped but that is not the case; what drives the value of the island is that it is the best maintained estate in Nigeria.”
Ubosi, former Africa President of International Real Estate Federation (FIABCI), added that “the island has the best security, facilities and services, and it has become a brand on its own. Everybody who has got some money wants to live on the island. Nobody is now thinking of living in old Ikoyi. People are now ready to pay extra to live in this island.”
“Prices have gone up there by over 50 percent because a 1,000 square metres of land that sold for N260 million in 2014 now goes for N370 million or more. It will continue to be so because as the available land reduces, and the island continues to be a coveted and sought after address, prices will continue to go up. The infrastructure and services here are second to none”, he said.
It is against this backdrop that a developer who plays at the luxury end of the property market said it was a ‘chilling surprise’ for him to hear that a building collapsed in this enclave which, for him, represents the best of real estate destinations in the country.
“Though we are not directly affected, we feel it is a big blow on all of us who play in that segment of the market. It has a lot of implications for us. Now, buyers are going to be lot more inquisitive just as lenders will be very serious with financial risk, thus raising the cost,” the developer who did not want to be named said.
He was worried that Diaspora Nigerians who are the main drivers of the luxury market would henceforth be withholding investment in properties since even the best of locations in a city that prides itself as the ‘Centre of Excellence’ is no longer safe for investment.
“Building failures do happen, but there are locations that they are least expected. Banana Island is one such locations. But it has happened here. We will however continue to do the best we are known for—delivering premium products with the best of materials, using the best contractors in the world,” he assured.
