Kenya’s housing sector faces structural hurdles that continue to widen the gap between demand and supply.
With an estimated 2 million-unit deficit, the country needs about 250,000 new homes annually but delivers only around 50,000, according to sector data. For developers like Superior Homes Kenya, known for master-planned projects such as Greenpark Estate in Athi River, the challenge lies not just in building homes but in making them affordable, accessible, and resilient against rising costs and macroeconomic volatility.
Unlocking Finance Through Partnerships
One of the biggest obstacles in Kenya’s housing market is affordability. The country has just about 30,000 active mortgage accounts and a mortgage stock of KShs 279-281.5 billion, representing less than 2% of GDP. This under-penetration means many middle-income households cannot qualify for traditional bank mortgages.
Superior Homes has moved to address this through strategic banking partnerships. In 2024, it signed a deal with KCB Bank to provide buyers with flexible mortgage products, including access to KMRC-backed loans that extend repayment terms and allow borrowers to finance up to 105% of the property value, covering both purchase and associated costs.
In 2025, Superior Homes deepened its financing strategy by partnering with HFC Kenya (HF Group). The deal provides buyers with mortgages at 9.5% interest over 20 years, significantly lower than prevailing market rates. Because HFC is a founding member of the Kenya Mortgage Refinance Company, these products are indirectly supported by KMRC’s refinancing framework, which is designed to boost mortgage accessibility in Kenya.
By aligning with lenders that can tap into KMRC facilities, Superior Homes is effectively broadening the financing options available to its buyers, bridging a critical affordability gap.
Navigating Construction Realities with Strategic Community Design
Rising construction costs remain a challenge across Kenya’s housing sector, with the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics reporting steady increases in cement, steel, and fuel prices through 2023 and 2024.
Rather than focusing narrowly on procurement tactics, Superior Homes has turned to integrated community design and sustainability features to deliver long-term value. Its Lukenya Plains project, launched in Machakos County in 2024 at a cost of KShs 14 billion, incorporates solar power, water recycling systems, sewer treatment, and waste management solutions. These features are intended to reduce operational costs for homeowners while enhancing resilience to rising input and utility expenses.
By embedding sustainability into its developments, Superior Homes is differentiating itself while giving residents tools to manage households expenses more efficiently- an indirect but powerful response to sector-wide cost pressures.
Leveraging Location to Balance Affordability
Urbanisation is reshaping housing demand. Nearly 17 million Kenyans, about 30% of the population, live in cities, with Nairobi and its surrounding commuter towns absorbing much of this growth. Rising land prices in central Nairobi have made housing increasingly unaffordable for the middle class.
Superior Homes’ decision to concentrate developments in Athi River, along the Nairobi-Mombasa highway, reflects a deliberate strategy to balance affordability and accessibility. Land costs are lower than in central Nairobi, while improving infrastructure links buyers to the capital’s job market. This location strategy positions the company to meet urbanising demand without pricing out its core customer base.
Building Lifestyle-Oriented Communities
Beyond affordability, Superior Homes has embraced a community-based development model. Projects like Greenpark Estate are designed as integrated communities with schools, retail outlets, hospitality facilities, and recreational amenities. This approach enhances the appeal of its housing units, creating long-term value for residents and insulating the developer from short-term sales pressures by offering a broader lifestyle proposition.
The challenges facing Kenya’s housing sector- limited access to mortgages, volatile construction costs, and rapid urbanisation- are formidable. Yet Superior Homes Kenya has shown that they can be addressed through a mix of financial innovation, sustainability-driven community design, strategic location choices, and lifestyle-oriented developments.
In an industry defined by unmet demand, Superior Homes’ pragmatic responses underscore that the future belongs to developers who can finance the buyer, stabilise delivery, and create lasting value. For Kenya, closing the housing deficit will depend not only on building more homes but on building them differently- and Superior Homes is setting a template for how that can be done.
