UAE real estate market points way to Nigeria on industry regulation – Crest Range’s CEO

Olatubosun Fatoki is the founder & CEO of Crest Range Properties LLC in Abu Dhabi. In this interview with JOSEPHINE OKOJIE-OKEIYI, he spoke about his entrepreneurship journey into the UAE real estate industry and what Nigeria can learn from the country. Excerpts:

Why did you choose Abu Dhabi rather than Nigeria to set up your real estate business?

I moved to the UAE in 2016, although before then I had a little outside baseline experience in Nigeria’s real estate.

I had worked with a real estate magazine-producing company for about a year, so I have an idea of what the baseline knowledge of real estate could be. I’ve been a salesperson all my life, right from my university days to becoming a graduate.

I’m one person that can sell you to you if you know what that means. I just wanted something in any industry where I could show my skills as a salesperson and my experience.

Getting into UAE, I was job hunting and when I came in, there were lots of real estate projects ongoing in the country. I know that real estate here has a future that can withstand the test of time. I opted for real estate, knowing that I have a baseline experience while in Nigeria.

With my experience in sales, I started in real estate as an off-plan salesperson in Dubai. Then from there, I was in Dubai for two years, commuting from Abu Dhabi to Dubai daily. I was trying to learn the city, environment, and industry to know how things work here and how to go about it.

In the process, I started building a database and portfolio of clients and a network in the market in the city. A huge percentage of my businesses were coming from references, because of people that I’ve worked with who have been comfortable with how I deal with them.

“If you are looking at taking advantage of the international market as an investor and making a huge return in the long term, you can always look at international investments because they offer you more than what investing back home offers.”

I joined a company that was one of the biggest in real estate back then globally. They already have their brand in the market, so clients come in to pick because they have about three islands that they manage.

We didn’t have much to do, but I wasn’t basing my job or performance on what the company had already provided. Maybe in a month, I’m doing about 8-10 deals, and a large percentage of these deals were not coming from the properties that the company I work with was offering.

They were coming from the network I had built in the market, people that I had met. At this point, I felt okay. I think I’m getting to a point in the market now where I’m sitting down and people are already calling for my services.

People are already giving me properties to handle, and manage on their behalf. During COVID, the company shut down unfortunately.

After the company shut down, right there when we were told that the company was closing down, I knew it was time. Going by the market, the client portfolio, the name I built for myself in the market.

I started from there, researching how to start a real estate company in the UAE, and that’s how it started.

With what you have seen in Dubai where you currently operate, what are the peculiarities in the Nigerian real estate market?

In 2023, I visited Nigeria and looked back at what the real estate sector has been over the years. I would say that there’s a massive improvement compared to what it used to be back then before I left.

I mean, people are taking their time to travel the world and see how the international real estate market works. And they’ve succeeded in bringing those ideas and styles back home, which has now also improved the market compared to what it was.

Although there is still a gap between what it is in the UAE and what is back home in terms of how things are done, especially in the area of regulation, and management.

What can Nigeria learn from the UAE real estate industry?

We need to learn how to bring international policies and rulings into how real estate should be run.

A lot of things are still not done the way they should be done in terms of land practices, laws, and the regulations that real estate has to follow. And in terms of maybe in the sales, rental and commercial markets. All these things are regulated in the UAE.

I think we have the landmass, and facilities to improve our real estate industry back home, but the major thing lacking is regulation.

In UAE, real estate is highly regulated and there are a lot of laws that have to be strictly followed by a real estate company owner, tenant, property owner, or a company that runs commercial businesses.

The real estate is broad, there are different aspects and it is segmented and monitored. There is the property management part, the facility management, there is the maintenance part of real estate.

A lot of things are put in place here that Nigeria can also learn from, which I believe will help our real estate back home.

Which country, Nigeria or the UAE, offers more attractive opportunities for Nigerian real estate investors?

I would say that investing in the UAE or Nigeria could be based on different reasons for different investors. If you are looking at taking advantage of the international market as an investor and making a huge return for yourself in the long term, you can always look at international investments because they offer you more than what investing back home offers.

Also, it comes regulated and you know that there is a level of security for your property. If you are looking at the long term of what investing in UAE at large offers, it is one of the best countries in the world where you can invest in. It is worth taking advantage of because of what the country has offered in terms of security, hospitality, and exposure to the outside world.

But with the way our economy is compared to the economy of a country like UAE, the exchange, the way we are, our international trade is not favourable enough to put your investments back home and expect the kind of return you get on what you have here.

How can Nigerians mitigate risks associated with investing in international real estate, particularly in a market like Dubai?

It takes me back to what I said about regulation. This is a highly regulated country and market. UAE has practically developed regulations that protect investors against risk.

First of all, UAE has been one of the safest countries in the world and it has been like that over the years where your investments can be very secure.

Secondly, the government protects you if you’re investing in a project here, you pay directly to the government and the government pays the developer. It’s a kind of an account by the developer owned by the government which we call an escrow account.

Before a developer can start the project here, they should have shown proof of capability to the government that we can see out this project with or without investors’ funds.

So, at every stage of the project, the government releases this money to the developer, by doing so, your money is protected.

Riding off the back of your real estate experience in the diaspora, what do you think are the solutions to Nigeria’s housing deficit?

Talking about the housing deficits back home, I would say that there’s still a lot for our government to do.

I think, back home, the government has to liaise with the developers in housing projects that could be much more affordable and easily accessible to the general public. The banks have to be involved to provide cheap credit.

Also, the government should come up with policies that support people. I know a lot of people want to be homeowners and a lot of people want to invest in this.

But, in my opinion, there should be much more regulation, and policies that can attract investments into the sector. With this, we can mitigate the housing deficit issues in Nigeria.

How is the Nigeria-UAE visa issue affecting Nigerian businesses in Dubai/Abu Dhabi?

It would have been much better for Nigerian businesses in the UAE if there were no visa issues between the two countries.

As Nigerians, it would have been great if we could easily do business with our country men and women back home.

Some Nigerians who had properties in the UAE were forced to sell because they couldn’t have access to come and see their properties. It is not just affecting us in real estate but also other industries here.

The mood among Nigerian entrepreneurs here has not been great, we are only taking advantage of the limited opportunity to deal with ourselves here.

I plead with the federal government to find common ground with the UAE government to resolve the visa issue so Nigerians can come to the country.