(ERGO) – Zakariye Barre Mohamoud is now renting a two-roomed corrugated iron house in Mogadishu’s Bangala, neighbourhood in Deynile district after having to move out of his house in Hodan district in October 2021 due to rising rent.
He has to leave home at four in the morning as there is no public transport operating in Bangala. He walks for 40 minutes to reach his workplace, a restaurant in Soobe. Two of his children who were in grade one at Dhagaxtuur public primary school have been at home since they moved, as there are only private schools in Bangala that are beyond his means.
“The two problems I encountered when I moved here are that my children are out of school, and I have to leave home very early in the morning to get to work on time. There is the danger of muggers at that time in the morning. You have to carry a weapon to defend yourself,” he said.
Zakariye earns about six dollars as a daily wage from the restaurant. The rent for the two-roomed house in Hodan had risen to a staggering $120 per month. He now pays $30 rent in Bangala.
He had lived in Hodan since 2010 and had not experienced such dramatic rent increases until recently. He said landlords were raising the rent every year, putting certain locations out of reach for low-income earners.
“The rent was reasonable at first, but when a lot of people moved to the area, the rent more than doubled. I raised three children in that home,” he reminisced.
The doubling of rent in the last two years in some districts of Mogadishu has forced scores of families, some of whom have lived there for many years, further outside the city. The places that are becoming unaffordable include Waberi, Hodan, Abdiaziz, Hamar Jajab, Wadajir, Warta Nabada, Bondhere and Shangani.
Abdullahi Mohamoud Dubow, 22, has dropped out of Somali National University and is now helping his father to support the family. He has rented a tuk-tuk taxi which he operates in the city.
Abdullahi, a second-year law student at the public university, dropped out in April 2021, when his family had to leave their house near the university in Wadajir district. The rent had reached $300 a month. They are now renting in Kubadley in Karan district at $40 a month.
His father is a public transport driver and earning four dollars a day, which is not enough to pay the rent and the daily bills.
Hussein Abdullahi Hassan, a local engineer, told Radio Ergo that the rise in rents is due to the influx of people to these districts, which has created more demand for rental housing. He said the influx of people is related to insecurity in other districts and regions, where people do not want to live if they can afford not to.
Hussein noted that landlords are taking advantage of the high demand and raising rents because there are no laws to regulate increases. He said in some districts, a one-roomed house goes for $150, forcing out those who cannot afford such inflated prices.
