Rwanda needs 5.5 million housing units up from 2.5 million housing units in 2019 to accommodate an estimated 22 million people in 2050 according to Rwanda Housing Authority.
Vincent Rwigamba, the Director of Housing Planning at Rwanda Housing Authority (RHA) said that this requires building at least 150,000 housing units every year to satisfy the demand.
The Ministry of Infrastructure says that more real estate firms ought to invest in affordable housing to meet the demand for dwelling units that is projected at 310,000 housing units per year by 2032.
Currently 217,000 units are needed in the country considering the current population.
In Kigali city alone, there is a shortage of over 30,000 dwelling units out of 31,279 units needed every year, according to studies.
With the demand, Rwigamba, explained that the government is working on different alternatives to ensure affordable houses get easily available to the growing population in secondary cities, satellite cities and Kigali city.
He said that the number of secondary cities has increased according to the land use master plan saying that affordable houses will be needed.
Initially six secondary cities included Muhanga, Huye, Rusizi, Rubavu, Nyagatare and Musanze.
"Muhanga has been now considered as a satellite city,” he said.
The current secondary cities include Nyagatare, Huye, Rubavu, Rusizi, Musanze and Kirehe, Karongi.
The satellite cities include Muhanga, Rwamagana and Bugesera.
"We are also acquiring land in what we call ‘land bank’ for affordable housing in secondary cities and affordable houses have been developed in Muhanga and Rubavu secondary cities while investors are being mobilized in other districts,” he said.
He said affordable housing development and informal settlements upgrading must go together.
"An alternative plan for informal settlement upgrading is to link affordable housing development with informal settlement upgrading,” he said.
"Owners of land will provide land to developers and then get improved housing units. You give land because you are too poor to develop it and the developer constructs a decent house so you share units. It means the developers get free land so it is a win-win situation,” he explained.
The target, he said, is to reduce informal settlements currently at 63 percent to 0 percent by the year 2050 by reducing 20 percent every 7 years and also ensure people get decent and affordable housing units.
Dealing with housing affordability
Jeremie Shyaka, construction technician earlier told this paper this year that there is need for different strategies to promote housing affordability.
The call is based on the fact that many low income earners can’t afford built dwelling units.
In Kigali according to Statistics from The National Institute of Statistics, around 54 per cent of inhabitants are low-income people who earn between $38.0 and $225 per month.
Around 13 per cent of them earn less than $38 per month.
The middle-income group represents 21 per cent of inhabitants whose monthly incomes range between $225 and $678.
Generally, he said, the housing market has largely targeted high-income households, which represent less than 12 per cent of all urban dwellers.
They earn more than $678.0 and can afford housing prices which are greater than the purchasing capacities of other categories of urban dwellers.
Access through private low-cost rental housing is one of proposed strategies to promote housing affordability.
Kigali city authorities and the Government of Rwanda, he said, should set up housing schemes that facilitate the development of a large number of housing units that Kigali city dwellers can access through long-term rent.
Progressive housing ownership through rent-to-own option is among the other practical alternatives for low-income households whose financial resources are very limited and do not allow them to directly purchase their own houses through a down-payment.
It is applied to enhance access to housing for a large number of households, within the limits of their employment contracts or incomes
Decreasing housing costs and change in investment strategies, he noted, requires developing affordable and non-luxury houses instead of planning for housing projects whose prices are out of reach for most Rwandans.
According to Jean Baptiste Nsengiyumva Senior Research Fellow, at Institute of Policy Analysis and Research-Rwanda (IPAR-Rwanda) there is a need for increasing capacities in urban governance to address urban challenges.
"As researchers, under the Utafiti Sera project, we are examining the current urban governance issues in secondary cities and related issues to generate evidence to influence policy and decision making,” he said.
The high cost of land, and imported construction material, as well as high-interest rates for loans have been cited as the main factors undermining affordable housing ambitions according to researchers.
Edward Kyazze, Urbanization Human Settlement and Housing Division Manager in the Ministry of Infrastructure said that there are various projects in affordable housing but there has been slow progress.
"But looking at the visit we had across the city of Kigali, secondary cities, we are seeing typical projects emerging in areas such Gahanga, Kabeza, Busanza, Batsinda, Maska, Bumbogo, Ndera, Rusoro to build thousands of units. What we are looking for is why delivery can be fast-tracked,” he said.
He said that offering land for free to investors and developing public private partnership projects are among the drivers of affordable housing.
"There are currently seven public private partnership models that require finance from the government to de-risk the private sector,” he said.