Nairobi luxury residential property recorded a 3.8 per cent increase in prices in 2022 beating major cities such as New York and London.
In the 2023 Wealth Report released on Wednesday, March 1, real estate firm - Knight Frank - put Nairobi luxury homes at position 59 in its Prime International Residential Index.
The city's high-end property tied with those in Beijing and came short by 0.1 per cent to beat Singapore.
Notable cities edged out by Nairobi were New York at position 67, Berlin at 68 and London which was ranked at position 75.
Overall, property in Dubai recorded the biggest growth at 44 per cent and was followed by Aspen in Colorado and Riyadh in Saudi Arabia at 27.6 and 25 per cent respectively.
According to the report, the growth in the prices of residential property was occasioned by the fact that the super-rich individuals were still spending their money to purchase homes despite the current state of the global economy.
"So what was behind the price growth? Wealth preservation, safe haven capital flight and supply constraints played their part, but the pandemic-induced surge clearly had more left in the tank.
"The pandemic underlined the fragility of life and the need for connectivity and sparked a mass transition to hybrid working. For the world’s wealthy, which increased their appetite to buy, with 17 per cent telling us they added to their portfolios in 2022," read the report in part.
On the other hand, Kenya was also among the most preferred destinations for property investments among wealthy Africans.
Kenya emerged as the second preferred destination after the United Kingdom (UK).
Notably, the performance of the luxurious properties also improves in comparison to the 2022 report where Nairobi was put at position 79. In 2021 the capital registered a growth of 2.4 per cent.
The increasing trend, on the other hand, has seen an increasing trend where homeowners are either selling or renting their property in dollars.
This has been occasioned by the performance of the Kenyan shilling against the US dollar.
“There has been increased preference from investors to have rent in dollar payments due to the ongoing depreciation of the Kenyan shilling,” Knight Frank stated in its Kenya Market Update report.
