Cement Prices Are Killing Affordable Housing — REDAN President Cries Out

By: Abudu Olalekan

Oba Akintoye Adeoye, the Oluoke of Oke-Igbo and President of the Real Estate Developers Association of Nigeria (REDAN), sat down with journalists recently to talk about something that’s been eating at the heart of Nigeria’s housing sector — the crazy rise in cement and building material prices. He didn’t hold back. DAYO AYEYEMI reports.

How are you responding to the rising cost of building materials?

Look, we had to come out and talk about this. It’s no longer something we can sit on. The cost of cement — and honestly, most building materials — has been going up in a way that’s becoming dangerous for housing delivery and infrastructure in this country. Flat out dangerous.

Over the last few months, things have gotten really bad in the construction space. Cement, especially, has become a serious headache. Our members — developers, investors, people building houses every single day — they’re worried. And they should be.

Let me give you the numbers. A 50kg bag of cement was going for around N7,500 towards the end of 2025. By early 2026, it had jumped to somewhere between N9,000 and N10,000. And it didn’t stop there. Right now? You’re looking at N11,500 to N15,000 depending on where you are in the country. That’s almost double in just a few months. That’s not normal.

Does this affect the real estate sector directly?

Of course it does. Massively. Cement is one of the biggest cost items when you’re putting up a building. You can’t avoid it. So when cement price go up, everything else follows. The entire cost structure of a housing project shifts.

And it’s not just cement. Iron rods, sand — all of it has gone up too. You put all that together and what you get is developers under serious financial strain. Projects are getting delayed. Some are being scaled down. Others? Abandoned entirely. Just like that.

Now think about this — Nigeria already has a massive housing deficit. We all know that. So anything that makes building more expensive is basically pushing homeownership further away from ordinary Nigerians. That’s the painful truth.

And here’s another thing people don’t talk about enough. When costs spiral out of control like this, some people start cutting corners. They use substandard materials just to save money. That’s how you end up with buildings that are not safe. Buildings that collapse. It’s a chain reaction, and it starts with the price of materials.

So what’s the way forward?

Something has to be done. And quick. On behalf of REDAN, I’m calling on the Federal Ministry of Housing and Urban Development — and every relevant government body — to sit down with stakeholders across the building materials value chain. Let’s talk. Let’s figure out how to stabilize these prices before the situation gets completely out of hand.

We’re also appealing to cement manufacturers directly. Work with us. Work with government. The housing sector can’t deliver affordable homes if the cost of materials keeps flying through the roof every other month.

REDAN is fully behind government’s efforts to tackle the housing deficit. Always have been. But let’s be honest — none of that is going to work if developers can’t even predict what cement will cost next week. We need stability. We need policy support. And we need everyone at the table — manufacturers, government, developers — working together. That’s the only way forward.

How does all this affect rent?

Now rent is a different conversation, but its not completely separate either. They’re connected, just not in the way most people think.

Let me tell you a personal story. Because of my new role as a traditional ruler, I had to relocate to Ondo State. My wife also moved from Lagos. But she still wanted a space to run her business, so we started looking in Akure — the state capital. Best city in Ondo, right? I figured, the most you’d pay for a good commercial space there would be maybe N3 million a year. I was so wrong. The cheapest thing we found was N8 million per annum. Eight million. In Akure. That’s what you’d pay in Ogba, Lagos. I couldn’t believe it. Akure is competing with Lagos now.

But when I sat with that reality for a moment, it clicked. It’s supply and demand. Simple as that. Rents are driven by how much is available and how many people want it.

And the supply problem? It starts with land. Forget building materials for a second — the real trouble begins the moment you try to acquire land. You buy it, go to site, and sometimes you can’t even use it. That’s problem number one.

Problem number two is titling. I don’t think there’s a single state government in Nigeria that has made land titling seamless. In the UK, in the US, you can process your title from your bedroom. While chatting with friends, you’re getting your documents sorted. Here? Two years. Three years. Still chasing paper. And after titling, you spend another two, three years running around for approval.

Being a developer in Nigeria is like being stranded on an island. You literally can’t afford to have any other thing doing with your time. It consumes everything.