Housing Finance Association wants Condominium Law

The Ghana Housing Finance Association (GHFA) is advocating the promulgation of a Condominium Law in the country. With an objective to regulate shared ownership of common areas in high rise properties, flats and other related issues, it also aims at inculcating the culture of maintenance among unit home owners of flats.

The development of flats and high rise properties have become a norm in Ghana, especially in the metropolises, as it enables developers to maximize the use of land and space. However, currently there is no Condominium Law in the country to instill discipline in the housing industry and facilitate the development of more high rise projects.

Asare Akuffo, Managing Director of HFC Bank, in a speech, said it was better late than never to promulgate the Condominium Law to make land use more efficient. Mr Akuffo, who is also the president of GHFA, was speaking at a dialogue session with members of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Works and Housing, to deliberate on the proposed bill on the Condominium Law.

He said the Business Sector Advocacy Challenge (BUSAC) Fund is undertaking an advocacy action to facilitate the draft document to be laid in Parliament. Mr Divine Letsa, a partner at ‘Bentsi-Enchill, Letsa and Ankomah’ (BELA), the Consultant for the project, cited the failure of the mass delivery system by the State Housing Corporation, saying it failed because there was no law to commit unit owners to maintain the flats and create joint ownership of the common areas and facilities in them.

The Condominium Law, Mr Letsa said, would run side by side with Customary Law or the Common Law, adding that the preparation of the bill was a formidable exercise which must be responsive, forward-looking and complement the reforms currently being undertaken in land administration and land use spatial planning.

He mentioned some of the advantages of condominiums as maximization of land use, convenient location of employment centres, shopping malls, and comparatively cheaper properties, noting that with the current housing deficit of 100,000 per year, high rise multi-unit apartments under a well structured regime was the antidote.

He therefore stressed the need for condominium regulations to address the issues and also enhance the development of the housing schemes. Chairman of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Works and Housing, David Tetteh Assumeng, called for more interactions to put the draft bill in shape before it gets to Parliament so as to ease the passage of the bill.

Theresa Tuffour, a Director of the Ministry of Water Resources, Works and Housing, commended BUSAC Fund for supporting the association to promulgate the law. She urged all the parties to share ideas and deliberate over the bill to ensure its ownership by Ghanaians.

The GHFA is a trade association of practitioners of housing finance in Ghana. Hosted by the HFC Bank, it was established in 2006 to bring together the major stakeholders for a collaborative effort at solving the prevailing problems in the real estate and housing finance industry.