African real estate leaders have called for stronger institutions, improved corporate governance and innovative financing structures to bridge the continent’s housing investment gap, warning that substantial housing demand alone cannot guarantee sustainable investment.
The call came at the fourth GIDI Intra-Africa Real Estate Conference (GIDI IARC 4.0), held in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, on November 2nd and 3rd, 2026, under the theme ‘Building Africa: Bridging the Funding Gap in African Real Estate’, with participants identifying weak institutional structures, inadequate access to long-term capital, policy uncertainty and poor corporate governance as some of the challenges undermining the capacity of developers to attract investment and deliver affordable housing projects.
The continent’s housing deficit already exceeds 60 million units, with the figure expected to surpass 130 million by 2030, underpinned by a financing gap of more than $1.4 trillion until 2030, while Africa receives less than three per cent of global housing finance despite holding nearly twenty per cent of the world’s urban population. The State of African Cities Report 2026 estimates that African cities face urban investment needs of approximately $157 billion annually—far beyond current public spending—yet are awash in untapped wealth in the form of rapidly appreciating urban land, with at least 51 million housing units needed today and the continent’s urban population set to grow by 700 million by 2050.
The scale of the challenge is compounded by structural constraints in housing finance systems across Africa, with mortgage markets remaining shallow due to high interest rates, short loan tenors and strict collateral requirements, while underdeveloped financial ecosystems limit the availability of long-term capital and increase the cost of borrowing. Weak land administration systems and insecure tenure reduce the bankability of housing investments, while inadequate legal frameworks, limited credit information systems and weak foreclosure mechanisms increase risks for lenders, with municipalities often lacking the fiscal tools, creditworthiness and capacity to finance or facilitate housing development.
Nero Ughwujabo, managing director of Pinecone Strategy Limited, said governments and developers must translate policy objectives into credible investment opportunities supported by predictable institutions, clear risk allocation and appropriate project structures, while Joy Coker, chief executive officer of AXP Africa, highlighted the potential of institutional investment, private credit, housing funds and blended finance to diversify funding sources for real estate development. The discussions centred on alternative financing models, mortgage-market development, housing affordability and collaboration among governments, developers, lenders, investors and real estate professionals, with participants stressing that bridging the continent’s housing funding gap would require coordinated action involving investment-ready businesses, transparent financial information, supportive government policies and financial institutions capable of connecting available capital with viable development projects.
The Africa Affordable Housing Compact, a UN-anchored platform designed to move beyond declarations, connects policy reform, project pipelines and finance through three operational pillars: a Deal Platform that turns projects into investments, a Data Hub that grounds decisions in evidence, and an Executive Fellowship that builds the leadership of future generations, with the Compact anchored at country level through Country Housing Compacts that translate continental ambition into national delivery. The Compact’s Deal Room Investor Special Session aims to facilitate concrete agreements between developers, innovators, financial institutions and development agencies, leading to successful project financing and implementation of bankable affordable housing solutions, with the session highlighting how the affordable housing sector presents a valuable investment opportunity for global financiers and institutions.
Effective housing delivery requires stronger multilevel governance that empowers local governments with real decision-making authority, predictable funding and adequate administrative capacity, with governments encouraged to recognise and support community organisations, civil society groups, small-scale developers and other non-state actors as partners in designing and implementing housing policy. Public investment and state leadership remain essential and should be scaled up, with a shift towards well-funded national programmes, while coordination across international, national and local actors must be strengthened to ensure global financing mechanisms align with local practices.
The challenge now is to convert the commitments and recommendations emerging from forums like GIDI IARC 4.0 into concrete policy changes, financing mechanisms and institutional reforms that can translate housing demand into sustainable development, with the African Union calling for national governments to put in place transparent mechanisms for sharing public financial resources to ensure that investment and operations costs of managing urban development are met at the appropriate level of governance. The path forward requires a deliberate realignment of policy, regulation and institutional behaviour around the realities of how the majority of African households actually build, transact, finance and inhabit their cities, with building municipal capacity in planning, land administration, revenue collection and financial management treated as a national investment into sustainable human settlements.
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