Muster, a property technology (protech) company has revealed that over 600 Nigerians have been able to resolve accommodation challenges through its AI powered peer-to-peer shared housing market place in last one year.
Nigeria with the highest population in the Africa continent has 44 million youths in active labour force of 90 million and also has one of the world’s lowest minimum wages at N18000 which has not been raised in almost 8 years.
This has left its youth with little or nothing to pay for a comfortable apartment in a country that requires over 20 million housing units to meet some of its accommodation demand.
“Muster has enabled people in Nigeria mega cities to have access to affordable apartments and also helped people that have spare rooms in their houses and apartments to be able to earn income on these spare rooms that would have otherwise been used for a storage or guest room,” Ibraheem Babalola, Cofounder/CEO of Muster told BusinessDay in Lagos.
According to the CEO, Muster was born out of the fact that there was a problem of income versus rent mismatch, as average rent for apartment in Nigeria is higher than the average salary.
“This meant that the average salary was higher than the average rent. Credit sales reports that the average salary of Nigerians between 20- 35 years old is around $230 per month and average price of one bedroom apartment in mega cities like; Lagos and Abuja is almost $300 per month,” Babalola explained.
Speaking on the cities where the company has solved accommodation issues for Nigerians, Babalola said “we have done over 600 which are in Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt and now Calabar, and we have about 3000 people on the wait list.”
Meanwhile, Cross River state recently appointed Muster as the official accommodation partner for the 2018 Calabar Carnival.
Through the partnership the CEO disclosed that, “Cross Riverians will be able to make extra income by letting out the spare rooms in their apartments/houses to verified visitors during the period the carnival will last.”
The company has plans to unveil new products into Nigeria property market which according to the protech firm will solve the problem of annual rent payment.
The Cofounder said the new products “will enable Nigerians to pay the house rent on a monthly and quarterly basis.”
Muster connects people looking for other people to rent apartments together, people that already have apartments and want to sublet part of it, property owners that have properties that can be shared by two or more people/companies as well as co-working locations.
The company’s target market is typically young professionals with an age range of 20 – 35yrs old, international holiday seekers and entrepreneurs, though it has plans to include student focused accommodation into its bracket.
“With Muster, we are trying to build a global brand for affordable living, the almost two years old frim said on its website.
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