Empowa expands blockchain housing model to Nigeria

Blockchain housing finance platform Empowa has announced that it is expanding its operations into Nigeria.

To ease its entry into the Nigerian house finance market, the firm has partnered with Nigerian-based house finance platform PropPay and a coalition of housing cooperative firms. 

Quick facts 

• The partnership was hashed out at the National Housing Cooperative Conference held in Nigeria’s capital city, Abuja, last month. 
• The initiative is anchored on a four-way partnership between PropPay, the Housing Cooperative Collective — a national organization representing housing-focused cooperatives in Nigeria and local real estate developers. 
• PropPay will serve as Empowa’s on-the-ground and regulatory-compliant partners in Nigeria, while the Housing Cooperative Collective will help onboard their members onto the platform. 

Empowa’s Pivot 

• Empowa, launched initially in Mozambique, has always prided itself on being a fintech company that uses on-chain liquidity to support housing in Africa. At launch, it partnered with local artists to create and sell NFTs to raise funds.
• Proceeds from these sales are received in Empowa’s EMP token and are used to buy houses that are leased to individuals on a rent-to-own basis. A portion of the rental income is then used to pay the artists behind the NFT artwork.
• According to Empowa’s chief operating officer, Greg Schneider, the firm has now pivoted away from this model.
• He told Mariblock that the recent cryptocurrency bear market and global economic challenges meant the firm could no longer raise money with NFTs. He said:

“We’ve had to refine our business model over the last few years.  [Some] major events shifted the appetite for crypto and blockchain, most notably the blockchain or crypto ‘winter’ that we have experienced the last couple of years. It was no longer going to be reasonable to crowdfund our houses at the scale that we needed to make an impact.” 

• Empowa is now looking to raise money via institutional investors, development banks and pension funds to fund its housing initiative instead. 

How it works

• Empowa plans to digitize housing cooperatives through its EmpowaPay platform by moving their records and transactions onchain. This will offer users and investors real-time visibility into how cooperatives manage and use their funds.
• Instead of saving in traditional bank accounts, homeowners store their money in Empowa’s EMP token, with full access to their balances. Empowa also helps them build onchain credit profiles that are visible to potential investors interested in funding its housing initiative in Nigeria.
• When asked what these housing cooperatives stood to gain from adopting Empowa’s platform, Schnieder told Mariblock that Empowa will help cooperatives automate their operations and improve transparency. He said: 

“Our co-ops in Nigeria, are of incentivized to work with us because not only do we digitize their platforms, bring transparency automation etc. to how they manage their accounts but we are also helping them to build a track record that will then allow them to raise capital nationally and help their members with affordable housing.” 

EMP Token 

• Schneider explained that the EMP token is central to Empowa’s model. Developers must deposit a set amount of EMP tokens as collateral before accessing housing funds — this safeguards investor interests. If they lack enough tokens, they can borrow from the Empowa community and stake them to qualify for loans.
• If developers don’t hold enough EMP tokens upfront, they can borrow the required amount from the Empowa community and stake them as collateral to unlock funding for their housing projects.
• According to Schnieder, plans to get the EMP listed on Nigerian exchanges are afoot pending necessary approval from the Nigerian Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).