PGP at the Homes & Living Expo February 2014

Property Advice
PGP Expo Booth

The highly anticipated Homes & Living Expo 2014 took place at the Sarit Center between the 20th and the 23rd of February. This was a platform for clients and investors to interact with service providers. Many estate agents, developers, interior designers, and mortgage and finance professionals showcased different projects. And various real estate firms also came out to share information on the best listings in the market.

Aside from the exhibition of complete, ongoing and upcoming developments and residential properties, seminars were held addressing different issues in the real estate industry in Kenya. These were informative and helped in answering frequently asked questions concerning market.

Key speakers included: Reginald Okumu of Arch Consultants, who spoke about investment opportunities in real estate. He noted that the demand for property has been on an increase and especially in city-like developments, contrary to previous single unit projects.

The Director of ABEC Real Estate, Sam Manjau, spoke at length about trends in the real estate market for the year 2014. Among his key points was the realization that technological advancements and social media have grown to become a strong influence in the industry, especially in marketing. He also shed light on the growth of mortgage markets in Kenya, noting that there was need for lower interest rates in order to make this service available to more people. Carol Kariuki, of the Mortgage Company, had a presentation on low cost housing in Kenya and the power of Saccos and investment groups in achieving this vision.

The event and seminars were sponsored and run by Buy Rent Kenya (www.buyrentkenya.com), which is the leading real estate web portals in Kenya. Its inception just two years ago was formed on the idea of a place where property seekers could meet providers. It was recently stated to be the 12th most popular Kenyan site, being the top property portal.