Quality Housing: Perception and Insights of People in Benin City, Nigeria

The need to ensure the production of quality housing has been of remarkable interest to the government of Nigeria, as housing quality is considered to be a symbol of a country with an effective housing delivery system. However, government policy responses to the need to provide quality housing achieved little or nothing. Indeed, the actual provision of housing came nowhere close to the targets specified in the national housing policy. Many houses in Nigeria are obtained through other modes of formal and informal delivery processes, which influence the timing, quality, location and cost of housing. Moreover, there is little consensus on what constitutes ‘quality’ housing, and why different forms of housing delivery—within the public and private sectors—are predominantly failing to deliver what people consider to be ‘quality’. This study was conducted to provide insights on how different stakeholders perceive and make sense of quality housing, and these stakeholders include tenants, home-owners, government officials and Community Development Associations (CDAs) in Benin City. This was achieved through the analysis of data generated from the semi-structured interviews. This paper contributes to knowledge by providing newer dimensions to which housing quality can be defined as one which is spacious, clean, accessible and habitable in terms of the finesse of the interior of the building. It should have good water supply and electricity supply; the environment should be quiet and conducive and the structure/building or house should be accessible by roads. It should be secured and comfortable.