There is already a thread on this.

Kenya is increasingly becoming an urban society. We may see some downward correction in 5years but not a burst. Look at the growing middle class and youll understand what i mean. Kenyans are getting more educated and also getting better jobs which are unfortunately in key towns.

8 years later

in 2049 some will still be talking of an impending property bust. Let them wait tu Nairobi today is like Hong Kong in 1964. The superboom to come has not even started yet given the perfect storm of socio-economic factors that God has divinely blessed us with
* Massive well educated technocrat and entrepreneurial middle class that is growing by leaps and bounds each year
* Irreplaceable strategic location. Muchina knows what he is doing when he makes Kenya (and not the more established South Africa, or the more populous Nigeria) ground zero of his push into Africa. The Kenya-Ethiopia corridor is the one to watch in Africa for the next 50 years
* Beautiful weather and abundant natural resources. Geothermal leader in Africa, Solar is climbing fast, We will soon be the number one Avocado exporting nation in the world in the coming 20 years and we haven't even opened up our oil taps jameni
* Very young well educated population which will spur domestic demand for decades to come
* Anti-Corruption push has true political will for the first time in Kenya's history. This is a strategic shift that will cause a structural change in the way our dynamic economy operates.

The future is bright in Kenya. Except for the perennial whiners and the lazy pessimists of course.

So in my opinion we are no where near bubble territory and real estate especially in good areas continues to do well. Some areas do struggle but that’s normal and there are reasons to this, it wouldn’t be fair to classify all areas as “struggling”

-Growing Economy, even if people put a negative spin, there is generally a positive economic growth over a 10year period hence more and more Kenyans graduating to the coveted middle class.

- Growing Population as population grows so does housing demand this is obvious. Putting this in perspective, we were 40mn just the other day only to spontaneously jump to 50mn people. Considering the high rates of rural to urban migration, the demand in general should grow over a 10year span.

-Supply vs Demand granted now we have a growth in structured real estate developers (Cytonn, VAAL etc etc) and also a growth in amateur developers so this is sort of bridging the gap however considering there was already a shortfall, it may take a decade or 2 with high levels of construction to catch up. Granted some areas have hit their saturation point and also developers are building bigger buildings with smaller units to contain costs but these are also running out fast (ask VAAL about their DIVINE development in Riverside, I expect Elite in Westlands Road to have a similar fate. They launched at 8.8m I can see these going to atleast 15m

DC there is an oversupply for now but this is because of:
1. Limited market
2. Amateur developers ran a mock with some of these very poorly designed, poorly located properties case in point some apartments in Athi River I had gone to see, they were very well built but You are immediately greeted by the smell of fresh meat as it’s pretty close to KMC their name escapes me.

Other arguments for Parklands & General Mathenge struggling. This is because of :
1. Limited demographic renters The muhindi client base is quite limited as they do prefer this area, most of these guys here prefer to buy their own houses and they do love to haggle do getting good yields is quite a mission 😂😂
2. General Mathenge apartments/houses priced over ambitiously. One General Mathenge 4 bed apartment roughly 5000 SQF was priced at 80m + where as a stand-alone new house on half acre in leafy Lower Kabete was going for 60m a few years ago. I had a potential client I tried to convince to buy the Lower Kabete house but he chose the One General Mathenge for reasons known only to himself. I know quite a few properties still unsold on this road and developers are dropping their prices to more realistic valuations. This by no means is classified a bubble burst rather just bringing overzealous developers off their high horses.

3. Market research not sure if this is done correctly or is done at all before developing apartments or offices. Eg Britam towers, UAP building. These guys all built Grade A Office’s at the same time for the same limited clientele causing demand for land and prices to sky rocket. I don’t think proper research was done before building these, the same can be said about malls in Kenya. Some of these developers just build because it was the fashionable fad of the day and not necessarily trying to meet a need. Which is sorta sad considering that this is resources they could have put elsewhere to have a positive twist on people’s lives and also generate income.

Property is all about location, bubble is for guys who bought in the wrong location. Uchumi must be having a huge seller's remorse 2.8b to 118m. Don't wait to buy, buy and wait.

Housing Finance is already selling houses at a 30% discount of what they were selling them @. Other developers are doing the same. When it takes up to 2 years after completion to even get close to 50% uptake, then you know things are thick!!!

True...the prices were based on hot air.