Tunde Adeleke,
Lagos
The first anti-corruption APP aimed at putting an end to fraudulent practices in the Real Estate sector was launched in Lagos on Tuesday by Ist Choice Property Limited.
The App was designed to halt the multi-billion funds lost to the real estate, property and land holding sector across Nigeria.
The APP, the first in West Africa had its launch draw participants from across the country.
Speaking at the launching in Lagos, the designers, Taiwo Oladapo and Agbana Gbenga said Nigerians lost over 100billion every year to ponzy real estate deals, making the sector one of the most high-risk areas of business operation in the country.
“The Real Estate sector can create 5million employment every year for Nigerians. It’s a big sector that is facing threat, due to invasion of quacks and fraudulent people. Ist Choice Property is here to help redeem the image of real estate in Nigeria. We have established legal framework. We are working with state and federal governments. At the end, the Nigerian Real Estate sector will be free from corruption and incompetence,” Oladapo, the chief executive officer (CEO) said at the launching.
He explained that the initiative will prevent millions of Nigerians from losing their hard-earned money to fraudulent real estate and land speculators whose activities continue to undermine integrity, trust and reputation of doing business in Nigeria.
“The new app has been designed to enable potential investors know where to invest their money while protecting them from the risk of investment in property that are disputed, already confiscated by anti-corruption agencies or that lack adequate legal status”, Oladapo said.
The 1st Choice boss said Nigeria faced acute shortage of housing, adding that less than 10 percent of Nigerians were landlords, while majority of Nigerians had no access to affordable housing.
“The country’s housing stock is very low with some 10.71million compared with the population of 230million people. In the past few years since upsurge in migration became pronounced, locals and the Diaspora have been making tremendous contributions mostly through direct housing and land investments. In 2024, Diaspora investment was $20.9b”, he disclosed.
Oladapo, however, said the Diaspora population lost billions of hard earned funds to fraudsters, due to the poorly regulated sector.
He observed that associated with investment in Real Estate development was the risk of increasing rate of corruption and exploitation of investors, including the Diaspora population by corrupt individuals, land and property speculators, which discouraged the genuine efforts of the Diaspora population, local and international groups from investing in Nigeria.
“Every year, the country loses billions of funds to corruption in the housing and property sector. This has to stop.
With the Ist Choice APP, an end has come to corruption in the real estate sector”, he declared.
The CEO argued that corruption in the real estate sector negatively affected the prospect of effective and functional housing and property investment in Nigeria, adding that with the Ist Choice Property new MOBILE APP, the first in Nigeria, it will save Nigerians at home and abroad seeking to invest in real estate and properties from corruption and the harmful activities of dupes.
Oladapo concluded that the new Mobile App would help potential real estate investors to eliminate fraud and enhance transparency in the housing and property investment portfolio of Nigeria which he said would ensure Nigeria gains respect in the comity of nations with transparent and corruption free housing and property investment, apart from helping Nigeria safe billions of funds every year that would have gone into corruption industry.
