1.1 Introduction
Real estate can be defined as an area or amount of land or property. Estate management is quite a broad term for a number of areas that include property management, surveying, business and finance and the built environment. Closer ties are beginning to emerge between estate and property management and business and financial practices, and essentially the subject is primarily concerned with the valuation and management of land and buildings in the public and private sector. Estate Managers typically set the service standard and are responsible for the hiring, training, and ongoing management of staff required to meet the service needs of the household. With house prices rising at an astonishing rate over the last few years and now the recession, the government has come under increasing pressure to be relieved from a ‘housing crisis’. This crisis has come about because of the rise in house prices which first-time buyers can no longer afford and a lack of affordable housing for the citizens. Also, the rise in investment buyers has meant that a lot of properties that those on average wages could have once been able to buy, now have to rent instead. All of this has become an area of tremendous interest. The government has predicted that more homes are needed, but where these houses are to be built has also courted controversy.
As a prelude to other parts of this study, this chapter will discuss the background upon which this study was initiated, the statement of problems that led to this study, the Aim and Objectives of the study. Others are Significance of the study, Scope of work, Limitations of the Study and Definition of technical terms.
1.2 Background of Study
Land use, land valuation, and the determination of the incomes of landowners, are among the oldest questions in economic theory (Shavell, 2004). Land is an essential input (factor of production) for agriculture, and agriculture is by far the most important economic activity in preindustrial societies. With the advent of industrialization, important new uses for land emerged, as sites for factories, warehouses, offices, and urban agglomerations. Also, the value of real property taking the form of man-made structures and machinery increases relative to the value of land alone. The concept of real property eventually comes to encompass effectively all forms of tangible fixed capital. With the rise of extractive industries, real property comes to encompass natural capital. With the rise of tourism and leisure, real property comes to include scenic and other amenity values. Starting in the 1960s, as part of the emerging field of law and economics, economists and legal scholars began to study the property rights enjoyed by tenants under the various estates, and the economic benefits and costs of the various estates, Epstein (2007). This resulted in a much improved understanding of the Property rights enjoyed by tenants under the various estates. These include the right to:
- Decide how a piece of real property is used;
- Exclude others from enjoying the property;
- Transfer (alienate) some or all of these rights to others on mutually agreeable terms;
- Nature and consequences of transaction costs when changing and transferring estates.
In addition to personnel management, the administrative functions are many. All related financial matters including accounting, budgets, and payroll normally pass through the estate manager’s hands. Based on the size of the property, the Estate Manager may wear many other hats. Depending on the nature of the property, an owner of property has the right to consume, sell, rent, mortgage, transfer, exchange or destroy their property, and/or to exclude others from doing these things. A title, or a right of ownership, establishes the relation between the property and other persons, assuring the owner the right to dispose of the property as they see fit. Some philosophers assert that property rights arise from social convention. Others find origins for them in morality or natural law. So, estate management system is needed to take care of keeping records of the estate transactions in terms of allocation, transfer of property, revoke or sale of a property. Maintaining such record manually will be cumbersome hence the need for an estate management system that will automate all estate transactions.
1.3 Statement of Problem
Housing is a basic need for all. Over the years, increase in population and income has led to an equivalent increase in housing demand. Managing these demands manually will pose great challenges and difficulties; hence there is a need to automate the management process. Keeping record in an estate concerning lands, buildings and their owners has been a great task to the government and the governed. Access to estate information proves difficult that most times people are defrauded due to lack of property information. Illegal sales of lands and houses without the consent of the owner are very common. Valuation of estate for the purpose of paying tax to government is not achieved, hence the need for computerization of estate management system.
1.4 Aim and Objectives of the Study
The aim of this research work is to develop a real estate management system to make estate information accessible to both government and individuals who may like to acquire building or landed property. In achieving this aim, the following specific objectives were laid out as follows to develop an application that will:
- Keep information on land size, land location and land owners in an estate
- Handle details for rent and sale of property from clients.
- Carry out data analysis and statistical inference.
- Produce financial and customer reports with detailed statistical analysis.
- Handle staff’s details and their different transactions with clients.
- Provide security to the client’s data.
1.5 Significance of Study
This research work is of great importance in that it seeks to provide innovative services relating to estate management such as providing information on land use as quickly as possible. Other significances it offers are found in the following areas;
- Updating and modification of information concerning land parcels, buildings, social amenities in a country or area.
- Faster and easier retrieval of estate information for instantaneous use of recipient such as government agencies, demographers, tourists and individuals.
- Identification of the amenities in the Estate so as to know which other ones are needed.
- Keep a database of all the lands and buildings in an estate
- Guide buyers on how to buy property and who to meet
- Educate buyers on the type of land to build in an area for proper estate planning.
- It will also aid in urban and regional planning.
1.6 Scope of Study
The study focuses on the Design and Implementation of a Real Estate Management System. The proposed project would cover the development of software to effectively manage real estates and implementation of the application software on a computer system.
1.7 Limitations of the Study
During the course of this study, many things militated against its completion, some of which are:
- Time Constraint: The time frame given to accomplish this project was very short due to school academic calendar and it was carried out under pressure which made the researcher not to implement some necessary features.
- Research material: availability of research material is a major setback to the scope of the study.
- Frequent power failure: This made the researcher append more money on fuel to ensure sustainable power.
- Financial Constraint: Insufficient fund tends to impede the efficiency of the researcher in sourcing for the relevant materials, literature or information and in the process of data collection (internet).
1.8 Definition of Terms
Investment: An investment is a monetary asset purchased with the idea that the asset will provide income in the future or appreciate and be sold at a higher price.
Real Estate: Property consisting of land or buildings.
