The price at which house agents, in conjunction with landlords and landladies, give out their houses in Enugu today is quite alarming.
The issue of accommodation is something the government should show interest in, because a good number of residents are finding it hard to cope with paying the huge house rents largely because many are living from hand-to-mouth and can barely feed.
For some years now, the cost of housing in Enugu has been very high. It’s true that the cost of building materials is not for the faint-hearted, but getting a place to rest one’s head is becoming an uphill task in the city.
A public affairs analyst, Samuel Ugochukwu is asking the state house of Assembly to show interest in this regard.
Mr. Ugochukwu urged the house to make a law that will regulate the cost of house rents in the state.
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“House owners should be made to stick to reasonable house rents that the people can afford no matter the class they belong to”.
An entrepreneur, Kelvin Onovo, said the
government can also try to build low-cost houses for citizens which should be made accessible to everyone. He advised that private estate developers springing up everywhere around the state should be strictly monitored, as many of them are robbing people of their hard-earned money despite the hardship being faced already.
Onovo is also calling on governor Peter Mba of the state to send an executive bill to the state Assembly that will harmonise the rents and streamline the activities of house Agents who often demand more than 50% of the house rents itself from potential tenants.
No doubt, many people are changing their habitation due to increase in house rents, shop rents as well as office rents.
To get a two bedroom apartment in GRA, Independence layout, Ogui Rd, New Haven or Uwani will cost not less than between N500,000 and N550,000 per annum. If you add the percentage for agents, lawyer fee and caution fee sometimes, it may get to as high as one million naira.
In areas like Agbani Rd, Emene, Abakpa, Obiagu and Coal Camp, one may see two bedroom apartment that goes for N300,000 – N350,000 per annum. You can get a room and parlour self-contained apartment for N250,000,
These prices are devoid of the agent fees and the rest. How would the ordinary masses cope?
Worst is, only few workers will be able to afford living in a reasonably decent apartment owing to the current hard time.
A landlord who spoke to Daily Gazette correspondent on the condition of anonymity said he just increased his house rent from N150,000 to N280,000. “It is not the landlord’s fault that getting an apartment is cumbersome. They are house owners with the intention of making money.”
Many landlords fail to even acknowledge the fact that as much as they own their houses, the tenants also have some rights according to the law.
Some of them make outrageous rules like “no generator from a certain time of the day till another time, no visitors and many other inhumane rules.
With the high cost of feeding, the priority of most homes is to place food on their table, provide other necessities like clothing and education for the children, before talking about having enough to ‘save’ for other essential needs.
It is time for the government to act !
