Looking for a lucrative side hustle to start without quitting your day job in Nigeria? You’re in the right place.
Side hustles are good ways of generating income on the side with little to no effort in Nigeria. And you will agree with me that the current economic realities permit no reasonable Nigerian not to have other sources of income.
There are many ways to spend money, and it’s not a bad idea to build extra ways of making money. There are many businesses and money-making opportunities in the real estate sector in Nigeria.
There are many sub-sectors in real estate. You can play in the industry by being a real estate agent that offers good services to people in exchange for money. You can make millions of naira every year doing this business on the side.
It takes little to nothing to start the real estate side hustle in Nigeria because you already have most of the things you need for the hustle. Also, the good thing about the hustle is you can later turn it into a full-time business and expand to other sub-sectors.
What is the Real Estate?
Real estate simply means property. There are two kinds of property: real property and personal property.
Real property is inseparably linked to the ground, both physically and legally and it’s immovable. The land is real property and everything that is attached to it.
Personal property refers to physical and nonphysical properties that are movable. They can be tangible, such as furniture, cars, clothing, or objects, or intangible, such as stocks, government bonds, or other investments.
This blog post is focused on Real property.
What is Real Estate Agency?
A real estate agency is a kind of business that involves buying, selling, leasing, managing, renting commercial, residential, industrial, and agricultural properties, and brokering deals between buyers and sellers.
Who is a Real Estate Agent?
A real estate agent is a person who brokers deals between property buyers and sellers. He is the main person who carries out all the services that real estate agency or real estate venture offers.
How Real Estate Agents make money in Nigeria?
Real estate agents make money on every service they offer by placing a certain percentage of the total value of the property deal they complete. What they earn is called commission.
An agent can earn up to 30% of the total value of the property sold, rented, leased, or managed. For instance: if an agent sold a property for N10, 000, 000, and he earned 10% on it. This simply means, he gets N1, 000, 000.
Imagine how much he can make in a year if he’s able to close and complete more deals than this.
Step by step guide on how to start Real Estate Agency as a side hustle in Nigeria
- Gather some knowledge
Before you dive into a real estate agency as a side hustle in Nigeria, you must gather some knowledge about it except if you did something related to it in school.
This will help to know the industry you are playing in, and you will also be familiar with basic terms they use in the sector and how they apply them.
It doesn’t take much effort and time to get the knowledge to get started. There are so many ways to learn these days and the Internet is the easiest one to get good information about real estate. You can pick good books to read and digest.
Also, there are some companies in Nigeria that offer real estate training to people who are just starting out and know nothing about the industry.
They provide short courses to individuals who are ready to establish their name in the game of real estate business in Nigeria.
By doing some Google searches, you will discover them.
Actually, it’s not really necessary to acquire some sort of training to begin the hustle. But having one will give you a hedge over a lot of people in the industry.
Who knows if your side hustle will lead to a full-time business in the future. Let’s say it does, you won’t panic because you have built the foundation that can carry the business demand of the industry. This will also prevent you from falling into avoidable debts.
- Get licensed
States issue licences to real estate agents in Nigeria to regulate their affairs and save the populace from falling prey to fraudsters who disguise as real estate agents to dupe people of their hard earned money.
Most states in Nigeria have a government agency or department dedicated to the issuance of licences to the practitioners. It doesn’t cost a fortune to get licensed in Nigeria.
Lagos State Real Estate Transaction Department (LASRETRAD) is the main regulatory body in Lagos. It costs about N15, 000 only to be fully licensed in Lagos. Here is the breakdown: application form fee of N5, 000 and certificate & processing fee of N10, 000.
- Network with people
It’s crucial in this line of hustle to network with professionals and build your contact. Having access to good information will make you record success quickly.
The simplest way to connect with your fellow real estate agent is by joining their association in your area. It doesn’t cost much and they are always happy to welcome new members to their midst.
Talk to a good number of them after the meeting and ask for their phone number. Even, most of the associations in present-day Nigeria have a WhatsApp Group they use to communicate and share information.
Once you are added to the group, you can easily view the contact details of every member of the association, and when you need information from anyone or you want to advertise a property or apartment, you just reach out to them.
Another way to connect with more realtors is by attending seminars, and programmes organized by established real estate companies in Nigeria.
When you attend the seminars, you meet people from different areas and different parts of Nigeria. The code of connecting here is the same: talk to a good number of agents after the programme, exchange contact with them, and before you know it, your contact has become something you can leverage `to thrive in the hustle.
- Market your hustle
This is another step to take seriously. If you don’t market your hustle, tell people about what you do, no one will know about it. And if people don’t know about it, they won’t patronize it. You need people’s patronage to grow and make money.
Market your hustle on your own both online and offline.
Innovations
Innovations increase business revenue. When you think deeply, I’m sure you will come up with fine innovative ideas. If you’ve ever looked for an apartment to rent or buy in Nigeria, you must have seen how the agents act–they appear to be unprofessional, and you feel something can be done better than what they offer. And I think a lot of people will feel the same way too. Why not innovate and do better than them?
You can start a real estate blog where you will be sharing useful information about real estate: tips about how to rent good apartments, how to own one’s home easily, how to invest in real estate, new developments in the real estate sector, necessary documents to have when someone purchase, etc.
When you have a large audience, you can easily market your hustle to people and you’ll be taken seriously because they know you are an authority here. Through the blog, you can be advertising properties for sale. You can also real estate companies advert banners on your blog while you get paid handsomely for this.
Nigerians in the diaspora want to invest in real estate in Nigeria. A lot of them don’t want to involve family members or friends because of the headache that follows it.
They use Google to find genuine information about the real estate business in Nigeria. When your blog rank on the first page, there is a high possibility that they will read your blog post and be convinced by your words and do business with you.
That will open you to a whole lot of opportunities. When you do one right, the client will refer more people to do deals with you.
However, you may be confused about what to write about. You can pick up good real estate books to read. You can research information on the Internet. Or you may be you don’t like writing. You can hire freelance writers to craft good content for you.
Or you don’t have technical knowledge of how to build a blog. No issues, I can help you to set it up at a very affordable fee. Just leave comments in the tab below, or contact me through the information on the contact page.
Wrapping Things Up
A real estate agency is worthy of having as a side hustle and fulltime business in Nigeria. If you take the right steps to start, and grow, you won’t believe how far you will go in the business.
Now that you have the information on how to step up a public tutorial centre in Nigeria, what are you waiting for?
Please, do let me know if you have any questions, contributions or contrary opinions about this information. Simply leave comments below. I would really love to hear from you.
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