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Factmore Dzobo
In 2010, Mathew Masuku bought a stand in Cowdray Park through one of the private land developers in the city. Masuku was charged $1,500 for the stand and what was only left for him,was to start building his house. Masuku’s dream of having a roof over his head is far from being realised, as he has been battling with the land developer, who continues to inflate the price of the stand to levels now beyond his reach.

“I bought a 200 square metre stand for $1,500 but the price of the stand has shot up to $5,000 , which is more than thrice the initial price,” said Masuku.
The shortage of housing has given birth to bogus private land developers,who are taking advantage of home seekers’ desperation.

Many home seekers are as a result, losing their hard -earned cash to these unscrupulous criminals.
Most local authorities are failing to service housing stands due to financial challenges, hence many are selling virgin land to private developers. Some of the land developers are unfortunately, buying the land for speculative purposes,instead of building houses.

Many home seekers have been victims of briefcase land developers who disappear soon after being paid for stands.
Land and housing development experts have repeatedly called on home seekers to deal with the reputable and registered land developers to avoid being conned of their cash.

Zimbabwe Housing Project Trust’ (ZHPT) Business Development Officer, Cloudious Sibanda said the government needed to push the proposed Land Development Bill into an Act. The proposed bill is aimed at regulating the operations of housing co-operatives, individuals and consortiums involved in land development and ensure transparency in housing delivery.

“We implore the government to push this bill which I believe, if passed into law by parliament, will regulate and introduce some monitoring mechanisms to rid the industry of bogus land developers,” said Sibanda.

He said land developers should operate professionally and refrain from cheating poor home seekers.
A stand in Bulawayo’s medium and low density suburbs costs between $5,000 and $8,000 ,while in the high density suburbs stands cost up to $3,000.

However, it is reported that buying a stand from a private land developer can cost twice or more than the price charged by the local authorities.
Zimbabwe Land Developers Association (ZILDA) Official, Sam Nyathi said the problem was that there was no concrete law defining a private land developer,hence the industry was now dominated by unscrupulous businesspeople ,motivated by a desire to make quick profits at the expense of home seekers.

“Since the introduction of the multi-currency system, bogus housing developers have mushroomed and are stealing from desperate home seekers,” said Nyathi.
Failure by local authorities to service housing stands has exposed home seekers to these bogus developers who disappear soon after being paid.

Bulawayo Mayor, Clr Martin Moyo, said due to limited resources, the local authority was unable to service stands to cater for the homeless, yet the city’s housing waiting list is ballooning each passing year.

He said in a bid to protect home seekers from being charged exorbitant prices for stands, the council had introduced a system whereby home seekers can buy stands directly from council.

“We have realised that many home seekers are falling prey to some private land developers,who buy land from the city council and keep it for speculative purposes. It has also come to our attention that there’re some reports of double allocation of stands ,by some of the private land developers. To prevent home seekers from being swindled of their money by these bogus land developers, home seekers can now buy stands directly from council,” he said.

The system allows an individual to pay cash or an agreed amount of deposit to council and pay the balance over a given period.