The foremost School of Estate, which specialises in teaching people the nitty-gritty of real estate business, has opened its online classes to the general public, the school authorities have announced.
Akin Olawore, the school’s director of studies, disclosed this to journalists at the inauguration of the online platform in Lagos last week, adding that the school had been in existence since early 1990s, offering offline physical classroom courses in real estate to students.
But in order to accommodate the growing number of students, especially those who cannot make it to the school’s main campus at Onigbongbo, Maryland, Lagos, the school has to embrace technology by taking the courses online in order to accommodate everyone, everywhere.
“With the online classroom, the school can now conveniently take care of all our students wherever they may be around the world,” Olawore said.
Debo Adejana, CEO, School of Estate, said the motivation to go online resulted from the fact that the knowledge the school impacts on people is relevant anywhere in the world, not just for the people in Lagos.
“We are going online now because we realise that the knowledge we share is something that can be distributed everywhere, beyond the shores of Nigeria, let alone within Lagos State,” Adejana said.
This means that all real estate enthusiasts now have the opportunity to learn at their convenience and can choose where to learn, when to learn and at affordable rate.
“The reach of the school cuts across everyone in every profession, not just those in building professions,” Stephen Ajayi James, facilitator, School of Estate, clarified.
While doing all these, according to Adejana, the school takes cognisance of the quality of education dished out to students online. The system is synchronised such that what is taught offline and online are quality-based.
“We also take cognizance of quality to ensure that what we offer offline is also as good as what we offer online. So, when you take courses online, it is as good as taking them offline,” Adejana assured.
But online platform has more to offer. One of the advantages of taking courses online is that students have the liberty to study at their convenient time and can go over the topics for better clarifications.
“The advantage is that you control the lecturer. You can pause, do a few things and come back, which improves better assimilation,” Adejana said.
Another advantage that is unique with the online platform is that it offers the global audience the opportunity to contribute new courses and ideas to the platform.
According to Olawore, the idea to start a real estate school was conceived because it was realised that real estate is a big business. It is something that cuts across different stages, cuts across different professions and cuts across different endeavours.
“Ultimately, housing is important. Housing is the second in the hierarchy of needs of human beings,” Olawore noted, explaining, “because of this, there is always great demands for real estate, which means there is market for it; because there is market, money will surely follow it”.
However, the problem that has been associated with real estate is that a good number of practitioners do not have enough knowledge and understanding, so they lose money when investing in the business.
“That was the reason, after the financial burst, a lot of funds were lost. A lot of real estate assets were stuck. A lot of people got scammed and a lot of people got their fingers burnt” Olawore observed.
Also, it has been observed that some people build because there is market but they do not build for the market. This explains why there are vacant accommodations, yet people are looking for houses.
“The reason is simply because houses were not built for the market,” Olawore noted.
Also, there are issues with land and cost. So, the sector needs the people who will be able to think through and see how to make real estate products fit to the market; how to make real estate affordable to people without compromising quality and standard.
Because of these knowledge vacuums, it is important to train and build a class of people, regardless of their background, that will understand what they are doing in the real estate world and equally understand the value chain and ready to take advantage of it.
The value chain in real estate is very big, according to Olawore, starting from seller of the land to contractors, food vendor at the site to gateman in a house to lending banks; all form part of the value chain in real estate.
The School of Estate provides opportunities for all professionals to be part. It equally provides opportunities for those who are already into the business and the upcoming, while at the same time providing ample opportunities for students to understand what they will be when they leave school.
CHUKA UROKO
