Meqasa Ghana together with one of the leading real estate companies in Ghana, Devtraco

Limited, and the Ghana Real Estate Developers Association (GREDA) on 21st of April this

year organized a real estate summit bringing hundreds of industry players to the Holiday Inn,

Accra.

The one­day conference was under the theme, “Real Estate: an Emerging Engine of

Growth” and the conference among its goals was to encourage collaboration amongst the

various stakeholders, create a dialogue which will bridge the existing the 170, 000 housing

deficit as well put across the various challenges facing the sector and finding suitable

solutions to them.

In his keynote address, the Minister of Water Resources, Works and Housing advocated for

a better collaboration among stakeholders to help improve the sector. Dr. Agyemang

Mensah also pointed out the information gap between the Government Sector and private

stakeholders as one of the major challenges facing the real estate sector.
“The sustainability and development of the real estate sector is the responsibility of both the

private sector and government. Government’s role is to formulate policies and ensure that

the rules and regulations are enforced to protect both consumers and producers.
“But often times, we witness a discrepancy between policy and practice. The reason for this

is usually the information gap between government and the private sector,” he said.
The Minister also touched on the progress of the real estate bill which is yet to be passed

into law. The Bill when passed will sanitize the sector, “a Bill for the establishment of real

estate agencies, which will regulate the real estate practice and connected purposes, is

currently before Parliament. The Parliamentary Select Committee of the Ministry is still

deliberating on it.
“When finally passed into law, the Bill will regulate real estate brokerage practice and

practitioners, real estate transactions as well as prevent the use of real estate transactions

for the purposes of money laundering and other vices,” he said
The Managing Director of meqasa Ghana, mr kelvin Nyame also stressed on the

importance of data collection for the housing sector. She called on stakeholders to approach

meqasa if they are seeking information of the housing sector.

The summit was well attended and participants provided positive feedback to the organizers.

In his closing remarks, The General Manager, Marketing and Corporate Affairs of Devtraco

Limited, Elvin Larkai, encouraged more investments in the real estate sector citing it as one

of the most lucrative, “one of the most reliable investments in Ghana is real estate. Not only

does it have a low risk associated, it also yields high returns.”