Oromia International Bank (OIB), in an auction to buy condominium shops of 40/60 housing schemes, gave the highest offer of 26.6 million birr for a 156sq.m shop.
The bank listed 171,000 birr for one square meter which is 0.50 cents higher than the second highest bidder. The price from OIB is also eight times higher than the floor price.
During the bid, the floor price for this particular shop was 19,364 birr. On the other hand, this floor price is equivalent to the total cost spent while building the shop.
The shops floated by the Addis Ababa Saving House Enterprise are located at Senga Tera and Crown condominium sites. These sites are now completed.
“We have managed to get prices from 19,000 birr per square meter as high as 171,000 birr,” said Abraham Tesfaye – chairperson of the Enterprise’s tender committee.
The bid was floated in February, 2018 and was opened last week.
In this regard, 320 shops were made available to interested bidders. Following the bid, 4,100 tender documents were sold.
The sizes of the shops range from 70sq.m to 395sq.m.
These shops are a part of 1,292 houses located in the aforementioned sites. It is to be recalled that these houses were completed and inaugurated last year after a public outcry over the delay on the completion of the houses. Most of them are now transferred.
“We are now looking into each document submitted by the bidder,” Abrham told The Reporter.
Like OIB, most of the highest offers during the bid came from banks that are in search of shops to serve them as a branch office.
OIB also listed such exaggerated price in a bid to open its new branch in the area.
“We know that the price we gave seems unreasonably high,” Abie Sano, president of OIB told The Reporter. However, given the difficulty to get rental offices or build our own premises, we prefer to offer such a high price, he said
As of June, 2017, OIB’s report indicates it has expanded the number of its branches to 223 where majority of it is located in Addis Ababa. The same report shows that the bank has also managed to raise its customer base from 97,530 to 167,451.
Established in 2008, the bank’s paid up capital stands at 1.16 billion birr.
The Enterprise, which is now evaluating the offers made by bidders, will soon announce the results.
