Fractional Real Estate Investment in Uganda

The other day I received a call from an acquaintance. He had heard about an investment offering I had put up, and he wanted to invest with me. “Benard, I have my 4 million Uganda shillings, please guide me on how I can invest it. I want to make good use of it.” I didn’t want to discourage him by directly turning him away but I also knew that his investment capital was too little for me to consider. My interaction with him left me thinking about the millions of people who are interested in one day owning real estate investments, but currently have only a limited amount of capital to begin.

One concept that people who have found themselves in this same predicament have adopted, especially in the more developed economies is fractional investment. For those who remember the mathematics lessons from primary school, a fraction is a part of something bigger. It could be a half, a third, a quarter or even a tenth of something. The number of divisions can go on for as long as you want. I wouldn’t want to introduce the theory of infinity at this point, some of the readers may start rolling their eyes. Going back to Real Estate Fractional investing, here, a number of people put resources together to invest in a property that they wouldn’t otherwise have been able to develop individually. Don’t get me wrong, not everyone who is involved in Fractional Investing can’t afford to develop the property individually. In this particular case, they could have other motivations for going the fractional way. It could be that they want to mitigate risk exposure, they might want to benefit from complementary skills possessed by their co-investors or any other reason they may have for making the choice.

What’s clear is the strength that fractional investment unlocks. Imagine every time you walk around town, you look at all these amazing skyscrapers tearing through the sky, and you can’t help but marvel at the visionary proprietors who came up with these ideas. For most people, they cannot imagine that they could be those proprietors.  I’m here to tell you that yes, it could be you. You and someone else of course. The beauty with pooling resources together is that you are able to accomplish the impossible. Just like a hill of aunts is able to accomplish a feet as remarkable as building an anthill that is several hundred thousand times bigger than the size of a single ant. One glaring opportunity that stares us in the face, waiting for someone courageous to take it on, is harnessing the power of the collective and guiding their investment efforts towards putting up spectacular properties.

The different ways through which fractional investing can be achieved include; Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITS), Direct Ownership, Private investment clubs, Developer – driven models and some hybrid models. Whereas REITS involve acquiring shares in a corporate body that owns multiple fractionized properties, Direct Ownership and Private Investment clubs may usually involve acquiring and managing a single property. Hybrid models develop from a combination of various aspects of the different fractional ownership models, usually as a result of customization. There are so many other ways investment partnerships can be structured, depending on the interests of the individuals involved.

Whenever you are faced with the challenge of determining whether you are able to take on a real estate project, you can always consider the possibility of partnering with other like-minded individuals to achieve this dream. Take advantage of the power of numbers to make the most of your investments. To learn more about investing in Uganda’s Real Estate industry, visit https://www.barosgroupltd.com/

About the author;

Benard Sonko is a real estate investment manager and founder of Baros Group Limited. For comments and inquiries, you can reach him on +256742140251 or info@barosgroupltd.com