Thousands Homeowners Risk Losing Title Deeds as the City Chases Land Revenue

Thousands Homeowners Risk Losing Title Deeds as the City Chases Land Revenue

Jun 27 , 2026. By NAHOM AYELE ( FORTUNE STAFF WRITER )

To obtain a legal lease agreement, the Addis Abeba city administration levies a six percent ownership-transfer charge (capital gain tax) and stamp duty calculated against the property's overall value. Rather than using the transaction values declared by buyers and sellers, district land offices apply their own internal benchmark prices, utilising the higher government assessment whenever declared prices fall below the baseline. For a large portion of homeowners, the unexpected additional costs of these institutional benchmark assessments have become the primary financial barrier to taking the final legal step.

For thousands of Addis Abeba homeowners, a house they paid for years ago may still not belong to them in the eyes of the law.

The city's Land Development & Administration Bureau has issued a final call to buyers who bought homes but never completed ownership transfers or collected lease agreements, warning that those who fail to appear before July seven could lose access to the service altogether. The warning leaves thousands in an uneasy position. Many have moved in after settling their deals with sellers and closing the details through legally authenticated documents, yet have never finalised the transfer with the Bureau. The properties sit outside their names in the formal records.

The deadline arrives in the final days of the fiscal year, when public institutions push hardest to meet revenue targets. For the Bureau, the drive is about clearing delayed transfers and recovering revenue from deals that stayed outside the formal system. At the start of the budget year, it planned to collect 45 billion Br in service revenue. So far, the Bureau has collected 16.6 billion Br, only 37pc of the annual target.

The campaign reaches a vast pool of owners. According to the Addis Abeba Housing Management Bureau, more than 450,000 houses have been built and handed to residents over the past eight years, 21pc of them by private real estate companies and the rest through other arrangements, including public-private partnerships and city projects. The Bureau is calling on residents who bought from developers or individuals and signed sale agreements through the Documents Authentication & Registration Service (DARS), but never returned to obtain lease agreements in their own names.

According to a senior Bureau official, who requested anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to the media, the decision is meant to bring long-delayed transactions into the formal arena. According to this official, some buyers have occupied their homes for five to 10 years without transferring ownership, leaving the city administration unable to collect the revenue those deals would have generated.

"We're compelled to issue a public notice calling on owners to collect their title deeds," the official said. "It's only right that long-time homebuyers transition into the legal framework. On the other hand, because they have remained outside the formal system, the government has been missing out on the revenue it is rightfully owed."

When a buyer purchases a house and seeks a lease agreement, the city administration collects six percent of the property's value in ownership-transfer charges (capital gain tax) and stamp duty, among the city's major sources of municipal revenue. The way that charge is calculated has shifted. It once rested on the price that the two parties declared. Now, district land offices apply their own benchmark prices, and where the declared price falls below that assessment, the tax is determined on the benchmark. For many owners, that extra cost has become the barrier to the final legal step.

The picture is more complicated, according to critics. Many owners are not refusing to comply but have exhausted their means to secure a place to live.

The deadline exposes a deeper tension in the property market, the gap between becoming a homeowner and a legally recognised property owner.

Ermias Fekede, a long-time observer of the housing market, believes bringing owners outside the registry into compliance is a necessary step. But he argued that the short deadline put pressure on people whose delays reflected not unwillingness but limited means.

"The approach could formalise long-standing deals, even as many owners struggle to find the added cost in so brief a window," he said. "While the approach will effectively bring illicit operations into compliance, which is a positive step, it poses a severe challenge for the majority who remained informal simply because they lacked the financial means to become legal."

Buying a house is often the largest financial decision a person makes. Many commit a lifetime's savings and every available resource to it; by the time of transfer, administrative costs become another barrier.

"Buying a home or acquiring property doesn't mean an individual is affluent," Ermias told Fortune. "Many buyers exhaust all available resources just to secure the initial purchase, leaving them financially squeezed when it comes to settling government fees."

According to Ermias, the problem is not that owners reject their obligations or want to dodge payments. They need more time and practical payment arrangements.

"The government is effectively telling people that before buying a house, they should already prepare the money they will later need to pay in fees," he said.

The Bureau's position is firm. Any transaction brought forward after the July deadline will face restrictions, including the registration remaining in the seller's name, and the buyer will be denied legal title transfer. According to a senior official, letting buyers occupy properties for years without transferring ownership cannot continue. City officials are convinced that thousands have benefited while legal ownership stayed in the sellers' names, creating uncertainty and depriving the city administration of revenue it is owed.

"The law must be enforced," said the official. "The government must collect the revenues it is rightfully due."

The Bureau's next task is to work out how many buyers remain caught in this gap. Officials say they are reviewing sale agreements registered through DARS to identify buyers who signed but never appeared to transfer ownership and secure a lease. The exercise faces a thorny question on how to separate genuine sales from the thousands of other documents filed through notary offices.

In the city's market, sellers commonly hand buyers powers of attorney after a deal, giving them authority to administer, use and manage a property without a formal sale agreement, blurring the line between an ownership transfer and delegated authority.

In the first nine months of the fiscal year, DARS registered and deregistered 422,011 power-of-attorney documents and verified 24,911 asset transfers for sales and gifts, a gap that shows both the volume of transactions and the difficulty of distinguishing completed sales from other authorisations.

It is unclear whether the Bureau will treat every such power of attorney as evidence of a sale requiring transfer, a distinction that could decide who should appear before the deadline. The senior official claims the Bureau has internal mechanisms to identify relevant cases, with the immediate focus on sale agreements registered through DARS. Even where records cannot be filtered, officials said, buyers who appear can be identified through the documents they submit during transfer.

PUBLISHED ON Jun 27,2026 [ VOL 27 , NO 1365]