How pilot landed a fortune in brick and mortar

Soft-spoken Mwenda Thuranira looks an unlikely candidate for Kenya’s rough waters of real estate development. But Thuranira is a household name, especially in Mombasa. His company, Myspace Properties, is behind some of Mombasa’s best-known real estate developments as well as the semi-annual Mombasa Homes Expo.  Myspace also markets, sells and manages properties for other developers.

The firm’s housing developments are mainly in North Coast suburbs like Nyali and Bombolulu. The portfolio of those developments is worth about Sh10 billion. Before venturing into real estate a few years ago, Thuranira, 36, went through fire when his fortunes dwindled after eight years of “hustling” in the United States. But he had already developed a thick skin for handling such adversities from lessons learnt while he was still a small boy growing up in Meru.

“My love for real estate began at the age of six in the hilly terrain of Meru where I used to build rabbit hutches for neighbours at a fee. I then “graduated” to working on construction sites, carrying stones and bags of cement,” says Thuranira.

After clearing his secondary education, Thuranira enrolled for a travel operations course at Utalii College for two years. Thereafter, he got an internship with Air France until the airline closed shop in the country. In 2000, he decided to look for greener pastures. His next stop was Orlando Flying School in America’s Orange County, Florida. Here, he acquired a private pilot’s licence (PPL) that he used to fly around with friends in small planes. The sky was the limit, or so he thought.

His American dream, however, seemed built on quicksand. With no regular source of income, Thuranira fell back on the “trade” he had mastered in his childhood – working as a casual labourer.

“I would go to construction sites in the morning and do some menial jobs for $500 (Sh45,000) a week. At least the sites in America have the advantage of using machines as opposed to all the work being done by hand. It is on those sites that I got to meet and interact with developers, home buyers, financiers, and estate agents - people whose ideas shaped me to be what I am today,” he says.

In between such jobs, the streetwise Thuranira also worked as a doorman at some hotels, helping visitors with their luggage.

Flashy lifestyle

There were good tidings in Florida, too. At a local petrol station, he spotted a Kenyan lady he had met earlier at Utalii College. Today, Onestar is not only his soul-mate but an administrator at the family business.

In 2002, the young man attended a Thanksgiving party in Atlanta, Georgia, an event that changed his outlook on life.

“I met very well-to-do Kenyans here. They were driving big cars and lived what looked to me as a very flashy lifestyle. A number of them told me that they lived in Dallas, Texas. I came to the conclusion that Texas was the place to be if I was to make it in America,” says Thuranira.

With his savings, he bought an air ticket to Dallas. Of the four dollars that remained after the ticket purchase, Thuranira bought a packet of cigarettes for three dollars and had only a dollar to his name when he made the move of his life. Thankfully, he got a soft landing when some relatives took him in as he contemplated his next move.

A fast learner, Thuranira was introduced to real estate by friends who were involved in home renovations. He also dabbled in the transport business.

Later on, he worked with ranchers who freed their large farms in Texas for real estate development. Thuranira and other like-minded entrepreneurs then subdivided the serviced plots for redevelopment. According to Thuranira, many landowners loved the concept as it meant more money in their pockets while they got to live in more modern homes as opposed to the age-old ranch houses. But it was the ease of doing such business that appealed to Thuranira.

“In America, the moment your plans are approved, the county governments immediately come in and lay the needed infrastructure. You can walk into a bank and upon showing your plans, walk away with a cheque to commence construction after a record 30 minutes. That is how serious they regard investors,” he says.

With things somewhat looking up, he decided to make real estate investments back home. He targeted Nairobi, Mombasa, Isiolo and Meru. Thuranira hoped to use these ventures to get a foothold in Kenya’s property market in future. Little did he know that the “future” would come soon. In 2007, the American housing market plummeted owing to a mortgage crunch. He soon headed back home.

Homeward bound

The networks he had established in the coastal city of Mombasa proved helpful, yet as he surveyed the scene, there were certain things that had to change.

“When I came back in 2008, Mombasa was already picking up as a preferred destination for real estate development. But there was a problem in the marketing of the units, making them stay on the market for far too long,” he says.

Ever eager to solve problems, Thuranira formed MySpace Properties, a company that has been at the forefront in marketing real estate developments at the Coast.

Speaking on the sidelines of the 12th Mombasa Homes Expo on November 20 2014, Thuranira said he is eager to bring some of the best practices he learned in America to the local property scene.

“In America, one cannot deal in real estate without formal training as a realtor. Why do we have people calling themselves agents, handling clients’ assets worth millions of shillings without any form of training?  I would like to see that change by training such people,” he says.

Among other challenges he wants addressed by stakeholders are the high costs of project financing, a factor that has the greatest impact on home prices. Coupled with this are the ever escalating costs of land in Kenya’s urban centres. He says when he came to Mombasa, half an acre of land in upmarket Nyali was about Sh9 million. That has since increased to about Sh50 million.

“Even with these prices, there is little land left for development in Mombasa. Mombasa is a very small county that has little room for expansion. We have to adopt modern methods of construction and fully utilise the little we have,” he says.

However, the recent incidents of insecurity in the area are perhaps the greatest threat to the unprecedented growth being witnessed at the Coast.

Most people in Mombasa, he says, work in the hospitality industry with the majority living in rental housing. But he says some of them may be afraid of buying homes because of insecurity.

However, the ever resilient Thuranira sees a silver lining in the seemingly dark cloud: “Such incidents can also mean that there are those eager to sell their property resulting in good bargains for potential buyers.”

How long does he see himself making deals in the industry?

“Until the wheels fall off.”