Review of Rent Act long overdue, but will it work this time?

The government, through the Ministry of Water Resources, Works and Housing, has taken steps to review Ghana’s 1963 Rent Act (Act 220), which states that landlords must not, at any time, charge rent of more than six months.

If the reviewed act gets parliamentary assent, the new law will now insist on landlords, landladies or estate owners charging rent of not more than a month. Ordinarily, this should be welcome news for all, especially workers who have to dole out a chunk of their savings to homeowners as rent advance.

We, however, wonder whether this new law will be adhered to by property owners, since even the old law, which is believed not to be pragmatic enough, has been flouted with impunity over the years by landlords and landladies, with the blessing of tenants.

Landlords or property owners do not only refuse to charge the prescribed six months’ rent but also charge very high rent for two or three years before letting out the property to prospective tenants. Tenants too accept the terms of the landlords, although not conducive to them, to ensure that they are not thrown out.

The difficulty in securing apartments on rental basis due to the very high cost involved is what has made many people seek land to build their own houses, leading sometimes to litigation.

It is either the same piece of land sold to two or three persons or it is land meant for road construction or a community project. Sometimes it is even a state land.

As we seek to fine-tune the country’s Rent Act and make housing available to all, we believe that one important aspect that must not be overlooked is our land use policy.

Many settlements that have sprung up in various communities in our big cities have very poor layouts – buildings have been positioned anywhere and anyhow, without recourse to enough space for roads, no provision made for markets or commercial centres, recreational centres, churches and mosques, police stations, green belts, parking spaces and other basic infrastructure needed by members of a community.

The high cost of putting up a building has also resulted in many uncompleted housing projects and the high incidence of squatters who have to put up in makeshift structures that have virtually no basic amenities such as toilets and bathrooms.

Housing for the people is very paramount and that is why we laud the government for taking steps to make it affordable to all. The Daily Graphic, however, urges the government not to only focus on how many months’ rent that needs to be paid but also put in a mechanism to determine the realistic charge for an apartment or room.

We believe that such a step will prevent greedy landlords from ripping off people who rent their properties. What pertains now is a free-for-all system where each person determines his or her own charge. It is a take-it-or-leave-it affair which has increased the country’s housing burden.

We, therefore, urge the government to be more proactive in meeting the housing needs of the people by taking a holistic look at the Rent Act and ensuring carefully thought-out policies are formulated to see to its implementation.

Tenants and prospective tenants also owe it to themselves and the country to make the revised law work if approved by Parliament. Any landlord who decides to charge anything other than what the law approves must be reported to the security agencies.