Real estate ‘cowboys’ running wild: Minister admits regulator still not ‘operational’

More than a year after parliament created a body to regulate Malawi’s real estate industry, it still doesn’t exist in practice — and buyers are paying the price.

The Real Estate Management Council was established under the Real Estate Management Act of 2024, with a mandate to license agents, enforce professional standards and protect consumers from the kind of dodgy dealing that thrives in an unregulated market. It was due to begin work in January 2025. It has yet to do so.

Asked why, Minister of Lands, Housing and Urban Development Chimwemwe Chipungu offered little beyond an assurance that officials were “trying to tie up some loose ends.”

The ministry had previously said the council would be operational by July, then mid-August.

Ministry spokeswoman Fostina Mkandawire now says it remains held up in “administrative processes,” pending formal gazetting and inauguration — both legal prerequisites before the council can function.

The practical consequences are already being felt. Real estate consultant Prince Machika says he cannot obtain a licence to practise his own profession, because the body responsible for issuing one has yet to open its doors.

He argues the vacuum is being exploited by unscrupulous operators, worsened by Malawi’s chronic shortage of urban housing — and that regulation alone won’t fix it. What’s needed, he says, is a serious expansion of affordable housing stock.

The bigger picture: a law can create an institution on paper, but without the political will to actually staff and launch it, the gap between statute and enforcement becomes exactly the kind of grey area bad actors are happy to operate in