A handful of school friends of mine in Nigeria, America, UK and Germany are putting sums together to buy a sizable piece of land in Lagos State for a private estate comprising old school friends. I have been designated as the Project Co-ordinator/ Chief Operating Officer. I have identified a respected family with enough land to sell. The estate has been charted, dry land and due diligence done. The land is free from government acquisition but designated for agriculture. My contact in government told me that this is not a problem; that most land in Lagos State are designated for agric. That we only need to pay about N20,000 for conversion. But a further probe shows we may need a further N200K per plot for ratification and again the Lagos State Govt may not be obliged to convert the estate to residential.

I presented my findings to the group and the house is split. Some wish the group to go ahead and others are against it. The problem is even highly placed practicing Lands and Survey professional in our group are also split on this. I have no experience buying Agricultural designated land and converting to residential. If you've had such experience please share your PRACTICAL experience. Were you able to convert to residential without stress ? or you just went on to develop without conversion and ratification? What's the implication and possibly danger of making payment and hoping to use school contacts currently in government to seek conversion? Most in the group think I'm too cautious and that I should sign off the deal. Are they right?

I had a similar issue. What did you finally do.

@ diordaves how did it turn out?