The economics of a Lagos plot have changed faster than the houses built on them. Land on the Ajah to Sangotedo axis now costs enough that putting a single family on seven hundred square metres is a decision that needs justifying. Ìbejì is the alternative: two complete three bedroom maisonettes, mirrored about a central party wall, each with its own front door, its own private garden and its own meters.
You live in one. The other lets on a normal annual tenancy, or as a serviced shortlet if you would rather. On current Ajah rents the second unit covers a substantial share of the total build cost over its first decade, and if the family grows into it later, you simply stop letting it.
The hard part of a twin build is not the plan, it is the party wall, and it is where almost every Nigerian duplex fails. Ours is two independent 225mm blockwork leaves with a 50mm cavity that is never bridged, separate foundations, separate wall plates, no shared joists, and services kept off the wall entirely. Impact noise, which is what actually ruins semi detached living, has no path across.
Externally it reads as one building rather than two, because a pair of identical houses staring at each other across a plot looks like a barracks. A single wide terracotta roof runs across both, the timber screens step to break the symmetry, and the two gardens are planted differently so the twins are not identical.
Who it's for. A buyer treating the build as an investment as much as a home, and anyone who needs the mortgage or the family contribution to be serviced by the property itself.
