Kenya is seeking to expand access to mortgage financing by encouraging lenders to consider alternative measures of creditworthiness, including mobile-money transactions, SACCO savings, rental payment histories, utility bills and business transactions.
The proposed approach is aimed at bringing more Kenyans without conventional payslips or formal income records into the formal housing finance market as the government accelerates its affordable housing programme.
Principal Secretary for Housing and Urban Development Charles Hinga said more than 280,000 housing units are currently under construction, representing about Sh731.5 billion in contract value and supporting more than 640,000 direct and indirect jobs.
More than 45,000 of the units are expected to be completed by December at an estimated cost of Sh52 billion.
However, Hinga said the number of houses constructed should not be the ultimate measure of the programme’s success, arguing that greater emphasis must be placed on ensuring Kenyans can afford and eventually own the homes.
“Ownership is not a single door. It should be a corridor with several doors, each opening onto the same outcome,” Hinga said.
He was speaking during the opening of the fifth Kenya Affordable Housing Conference in Naivasha, where policymakers, financial institutions, developers and housing experts discussed ways of expanding access to affordable housing.
Hinga said the rapid growth in housing construction must be matched by an expansion of the market capable of purchasing the units.
Traditional mortgage lending has largely favoured borrowers with formal employment, regular salaries and predictable monthly incomes.
The model, he noted, leaves out many traders, small-business owners, farmers, freelancers and other self-employed Kenyans who may have sufficient income to repay a mortgage but lack conventional documentation to prove their earnings.
He called for lenders to develop more flexible assessment models that reflect the way millions of Kenyans earn, save and spend their money.
Under the proposed system, financial institutions could consider mobile-money transaction records, SACCO savings, rental payment histories, utility bills and business transactions when assessing borrowers.
The approach would provide lenders with alternative evidence of income and repayment capacity while potentially allowing more informal-sector workers to qualify for home financing.
Hinga also called for the development of a standardised affordable housing mortgage with common requirements for eligibility, underwriting, documentation, valuation and loan servicing.
He said standardisation could make it easier for mortgages to be pooled and refinanced while attracting more long-term domestic institutional capital into the housing sector.
The government is also seeking to integrate the Boma Yangu platform with financial institutions.
The platform currently has more than 1.29 million registered Kenyans and could potentially provide a link between registration, prequalification, housing allocation, financing, acquisition and eventual issuance of title documents.
“The goal is to move Kenya from approximately 30,000 mortgages towards one million by building not only houses, but the market that places Kenyans inside them,” Hinga said.
Financial institutions have cautioned that expanding mortgage access must go hand in hand with efforts to reduce the cost of producing and delivering houses.
KCB Kenya Director of Mortgage Business Caroline Wanjeri, in remarks delivered on her behalf by George Laboso, Senior Manager, Affordable Housing at KCB Bank, said constrained investment finance, rising construction costs and inadequate serviced land were contributing to higher house prices.
Wanjeri said banks were therefore increasingly looking beyond financing completed houses to supporting different stages of the housing process.
“We are looking at the entire housing journey while seeking to make these solutions more accessible and responsive to evolving customer needs,” she said.
KCB also called for greater adoption of alternative building materials to lower construction costs.
The lender said future developments should incorporate energy efficiency, sustainable construction materials and climate-resilient infrastructure.
It added that affordability should not be measured only by the purchase price of a house, but also by the cost of accessing transport, water, sanitation and other essential services.
The challenge of financing housing for informal-sector workers extends beyond Kenya.
Shelter Afrique Development Bank Managing Director and CEO Thierno-Habib Hann said conventional housing finance models often assume formal employment, reliable land records, long-term funding and mature financial markets.
He said these conditions are either absent or limited in many African countries.
With more than 80 percent of Africa’s workforce earning income within the informal economy, Hann said housing finance models must be adapted to how people actually earn and save.
He called for increased use of blended finance, alternative credit assessment, capital-market instruments, green housing finance and digital technologies to expand access to home ownership.
Kenya Mortgage Refinance Company Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director Johnstone Oltetia said the housing sector must address both the supply of affordable homes and access to financing.
“This year’s theme speaks to both the scale of the challenge and the promise before us: to close the twin gaps that constrain access at scale,” Oltetia said.
He challenged lenders, policymakers, developers and other stakeholders to focus on interventions that can turn housing commitments into actual home ownership.
“Let this be the conference where we stop measuring housing by what we plan, and start measuring it by what we deliver,” he said.
The push for alternative credit assessment comes as Kenya enters a critical phase of its affordable housing programme, with the government seeking to demonstrate that increased construction activity can translate into affordable home ownership for ordinary households.
The central challenge will be whether mortgage providers, SACCOs, development finance institutions and capital markets can expand financing quickly enough to match the growing pipeline of housing units.
The two-day Kenya Affordable Housing Conference 2026, themed “Scaling the Base: Unlocking Inclusive and Sustainable Housing Solutions,” brought together policymakers, lenders, SACCOs, developers, development finance institutions and housing specialists from Kenya and other markets to explore ways of expanding access to affordable and sustainable housing.
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