A Nigerian worker earning the country’s average gross income would need more than 30 years to save a 20 percent deposit on an average-sized home, according to a global housing affordability analysis by BestBrokers.
The study estimates that the average Nigerian worker would need 364 months, or 30 years and four months, of gross income to accumulate the deposit.
The calculation assumes the worker saves 100 percent of gross income, meaning the actual period required would be substantially longer once food, rent, transport, taxes, healthcare, debt and other household expenses are taken into account.
BestBrokers based its analysis on property-price data from Numbeo and income estimates from WorldData. It estimates Nigeria’s average gross monthly income at about €98, while the price of a 108-square-metre home is estimated at €178,090.
On those figures, a 20 percent deposit would amount to about €35,618.
Converted at indicative exchange rates, the figures equate to roughly ₦154,000 in monthly gross income, a ₦280 million home and a ₦56 million deposit.
The naira conversions are illustrative because exchange rates fluctuate. The Central Bank of Nigeria identifies its Nigerian Foreign Exchange Market rate as the official daily exchange rate, derived from the volume-weighted average of transactions.
The affordability gap puts Nigeria among the least affordable housing markets covered by the study and highlights the disparity between household earnings and formal property prices.
The finding comes as Nigeria continues to grapple with weak household purchasing power despite improvements in macroeconomic conditions.
The World Bank said in its April 2026 Nigeria Development Update that macroeconomic stability had improved, with inflation easing and external and fiscal positions strengthening, but household incomes had yet to recover fully and poverty remained high.
The bank’s current country assessment estimates that more than 60 percent of Nigerians were living below the national poverty line in 2025 and says poor households can spend up to 70 percent of their income on food.
That leaves households with limited capacity to accumulate the capital required for a conventional home purchase.
The affordability problem also extends beyond the initial deposit. A household that manages to raise the required capital must still contend with mortgage availability, borrowing costs and the ongoing cost of servicing a home loan.
BestBrokers’ calculation therefore does not represent a forecast of how long a Nigerian household will actually take to buy a home. Rather, it illustrates the size of the gap between reported income and property prices by measuring the deposit against gross earning power.
The disparity is particularly stark compared with some other African markets.
BestBrokers estimates that workers in South Africa would need about 39 months to accumulate a comparable 20 percent deposit, compared with 138 months in Kenya, 245 months in Ghana and 259 months in Uganda.
At the extreme end of the study, the theoretical period stretches to more than 100 years in Zambia and Mozambique and more than 200 years in Burundi.
For Nigeria, however, the 364-month figure is significant because it shows that even before living costs and mortgage financing are considered, the deposit required for a typical formal property is equivalent to more than three decades of average gross income.
The result underlines the scale of the challenge facing policymakers and the financial sector as Nigeria seeks to expand homeownership.
The World Bank has said Nigeria needs to translate its recent macroeconomic gains into stronger household incomes, better jobs and improved living standards.
For the housing market, that means tackling both sides of the affordability equation: increasing the supply of homes that ordinary households can afford while expanding access to long-term finance and improving the earning power of prospective buyers.
Until those gaps narrow, homeownership for a large share of Nigerian workers is likely to remain beyond reach — not because the deposit is merely large, but because it is measured in decades of income.
