Online Reporter
Nelson Gahadza
Zimbabwe’s property market comes with a hefty price tag, particularly for houses and stands in prime Harare neighbourhoods — putting property ownership far beyond the reach of ordinary workers, the middle class and managerial staff alike.
In some cases, residential stands look more expensive when compared with similar properties in regional markets.
Property executives and analysts say the answer lies less in a simple speculative bubble than in a complex combination of constrained supply, limited mortgage finance and a market increasingly shaped by buyers with access to United States dollars.
The result is a market where prices are not necessarily determined by what the average Zimbabwean earns, but by what a smaller pool of buyers with hard-currency purchasing power is prepared to pay.
The scale of the problem is immense.
The national housing backlog is estimated to exceed 1,5 million units, with most of the deficit concentrated in Harare and Bulawayo. To put that in perspective, Bulawayo’s housing waiting list alone stood at 162 836 applications by May 2026, while in Mutare, the city council has declared it no longer has land to allocate for residential stands, with its waiting list now exceeding 30 000. WestProp Holdings chief executive officer Mr Ken Sharpe said the bottom line is economics 101.
“If there is more demand than supply, then prices go up. There is pricing pressure,” he said.
Mr Sharpe said in Zimbabwe, developers increasingly have to provide infrastructure that would traditionally have been expected to come from local authorities. This includes roads, water and sewerage systems, electricity infrastructure and, in some cases, boreholes and alternative power solutions.
“These costs ultimately find their way into the price paid by the buyer,” he said.
Mr Sharpe pointed to the cost of basic construction inputs, particularly cement and aggregates.
“If you look at the cost of cement, it is still extraordinarily high. It is one of the highest in the region and our cement prices definitely should come down,” he said.
He cited a sharp increase in the cost of gravel, saying prices had risen from around US$3 a cubic metre to US$10.
“Those kinds of things definitely have a bearing on the total cost,” Mr Sharpe said.
But Zimbabwe’s property equation is more complicated than the basic forces of supply and demand. Turnbury Property Developers director Mr Simanga Madhlabuta said the way Zimbabweans view property has changed.
“For many individuals and businesses, property is not simply accommodation or an income-generating asset; it is also a substitute store of value,” he said.
“That behaviour creates an artificial floor under property prices.”
Mr Madhlabuta said typical developer margins of between 15 percent and 25 percent leave limited room for significant price reductions without undermining the viability of new projects.
“If developers slash selling prices without reducing their underlying costs, new construction becomes less viable,” he said. “If they stop building, supply tightens further, putting upward pressure on prices.”
This creates what can best be described as Zimbabwe’s property affordability trap.
“High construction and infrastructure costs push prices upwards. Higher prices reduce the pool of potential buyers. Reduced demand slows transactions and, in turn, makes new development more difficult to finance,” said Mr Madhlabuta.
“Yet if developers withdraw from the market altogether, the supply shortage becomes even more acute.”
Real estate expert and Integrated Properties chief executive officer Dr Mike Juru cautioned against treating Zimbabwe’s property market as uniformly expensive.
“Property is fixed to a location, and the property market is specific location-related,” Dr Juru said.
In his assessment, Zimbabwe’s property premium is not primarily the result of an absolute shortage of land, but of risk and supply constraints.
“Prime suburbs and well-serviced areas can command substantial premiums because buyers are not simply purchasing a piece of land or a house,” said Dr Juru.
“They are paying for proximity to economic activity, reliable infrastructure, security, established neighbourhoods and access to services.”
The price variations across cities illustrate this premium clearly. A 300-square-metre stand in high-density suburbs of Mutare, such as Zimta Park and Vengere, sells for between US$20 000 and US$25 000. By contrast, a high-density residential stand in Bulawayo sells for between US$6 000 and US$7 000, while medium-density stands start at around US$15 000 and can reach US$19 000.
In some smaller local authorities, stands can be considerably cheaper, going for about US$2 600. However, the disparity is stark: An unserviced stand may be cheaper, but the buyer faces the additional burden of financing roads, water and sewerage systems, electricity and other infrastructure before construction can begin.
Dr Juru said the diaspora was another important factor shaping the market.
“Zimbabweans living and working in South Africa, the United Kingdom, the United States and elsewhere have access to hard-currency earnings, giving them a significant advantage over domestic buyers whose incomes have not risen at the same pace as property prices,” he said.
“This creates an unusual market dynamic: The marginal buyer setting the price may not be the average local wage earner.”
Experts note that a residential property is much more than the bricks, cement and labour used to construct a house.
Dr Juru said the problem extends beyond building materials. Developers, he said, frequently have to finance roads, water infrastructure, sewerage system, boreholes and alternative power systems before a project can become commercially viable.
“Those costs ultimately have to be recovered through the selling price,” he said.
“This is particularly important in newer developments around Harare, where buyers may appear to be paying a premium for a house but are, in effect, also paying for a package of infrastructure and services.”
This helps explain why a seemingly expensive residential stand may carry costs that are not immediately visible in the final selling price.
Zimbabwe’s urbanisation story is adding further pressure.
The 2022 Population and Housing Census recorded a national population of 15,18 million, with Harare and Bulawayo classified as entirely urban in the census.
For developers, simply reducing prices is not necessarily an easy solution.
Mashonaland Holdings highlighted the same tension in its half-year results to June 2026, saying development activity remained constrained by high construction costs, infrastructure requirements and limited access to affordable long-term funding.
The company said these conditions were favouring phased, demand-led developments, as well as refurbishment and repositioning of existing properties.
