As Nigerian and Ghanaian real estate markets progress and evolve amidst tough trading conditions, investment interests in these markets from global investors including DFI’s, private equity firms, and institutional investors have started rising, experts have said.
These rising interests are also driven by continued diversification of the economies of these countries, making their property sectors, once again, attractive to regional and international real estate investors.
These market realities underpin the choice of the theme, ‘Uncovering the Next Real Estate Investment Cycle’ for this year’s edition of West Africa Property Investment (WAPI) Summit taking place on November 26 and 27, 2019.
Kfir Rusin, the managing director of API Events, organisers of the annual summit which is already in its 5th edition, says the theme was developed with buy-in from local and international stakeholders, who believe that West African real estate is now increasingly attractive to investors.
“With more than 400 delegates attending and 70 speakers confirmed, including several globally respected thought leaders, this year’s WAPI Summit will again advance the real estate agenda across the West African real estate value chain,” Rusin said.
This year’s global investment keynote speaker is REITWAY Global’s chief investment officer, Garreth Elston. With more than $75 million under management, Elston comments that while REITWAY Global’s investment strategy is focused on global listed property stocks, he is beginning to prioritize emerging asset classes.
“We invest across the full spectrum of global listed property companies; currently this is in excess of 20 sectors and sub-sectors. We currently have a particular focus at the current moment into logistics and warehousing, as well as technology sectors such as Data Centres and Communication Towers,” he says.
With investment in warehousing and data centres by WAPI Summit stakeholders such as Agility Africa and Rendeavour, the region’s real estate ecosystem is increasingly diversified and sophisticated, yet requires transparency, regulatory and policy certainty to attract and retain investment, comments Rusin.
Elston says that despite growing sophistication and development in the regional market, West Africa’s markets need to take note that competition for investment is hyper-competitive and jurisdictionally agnostic.
“Markets are competitive for FDI investment globally, and if there is no respect for regulatory certainty, property rights and freedom of capital movement, they will continue to play second place to markets that provide investors with the most attractive destination,” says Elston.
And while West African property markets do not have the same amount of liquidity in their markets, Rusin believes that the high percentage of international speakers, delegates, and sponsors, as well as the over $1 billion raised and deployed by API Events’ stakeholders this year, provides tangible evidence that a new investment cycle in Africa has begun.
“in addition to Gareth Elston, we have secured speakers from across Africa and internationally such as Agility Africa’s CEO, Geoffrey White, and others, who are all motivated to network with fellow stakeholders in one of Africa and the word’s most attractive and fast improving markets,” Rusin said.
For Elston, a first-time speaker for API Events, the WAPI Summit provides an opportunity for him to achieve his objectives of meeting and sharing insights on property with regional real estate stakeholders.
“This is API Events’ 5th WAPI Summit, and our tenth year of operating across Africa, and we’re able to leverage our credibility of creating world-class deal-making events for investors, developers and operators.
As such, this year’s Summit and Expo is our biggest West African event to date, with more than 200 companies represented and over 40 sponsors and exhibitors with more to come, ” Rusin said.
