IAN COFFEE
You are not wealthy. You do not own multiple properties. You have a steady job, some savings, and enough confidence to make a decision that many people spend years postponing.
After searching for months, you find a modest two-bedroom townhouse in one of Windhoek’s established suburbs. It could be in Pionierspark, Hochland Park, Academia
or Dorado Park, or anywhere you like.
There is nothing particularly special about it. No luxury finishes. No swimming pool. No features that would make it stand out from dozens of similar homes.
What it does offer is something much simpler. People will always need a place to live.
The price is N$400 000. You secure financing from the bank, sign the bond documents and begin making repayments of roughly N$4 000 per month over a twenty-year period at an average 10% interest rate.
At that point, many people would look at the numbers and hesitate. Paying N$4 000 every month is a serious commitment. The property belongs mostly to the bank. You
carry the risk. You carry the responsibility.
Then a tenant moves in. He cannot afford to buy a property of his own, so he rents yours for N$2 500 per month.
The rent does not cover the full bond repayment, which means you still need to contribute every month.
That is where many people lose interest in long term investing. They focus on what the property costs today rather than what it may become over time. Five years later, something starts to change.
By 2011, the bond repayment remained around N$4 000, but rental demand has pushed the rent closer to N$3 500 per month. The gap between your contribution and the tenant’s contribution is shrinking.
The property is beginning to carry more of its own weight. A few more years pass.
By 2017, the same townhouse rents out for around N$5 000 per month. For the first time, the rental income exceeds the monthly bond repayment. Instead of adding money each month, you are receiving a surplus. (And? Did you know you can pay that surplus directly into the capital owed to the bank and pay down your loan even faster?)
This is often the point where the real value of patience becomes visible. Property ownership is rarely exciting. There are no dramatic overnight gains. Most of the progress happens quietly while life carries on around you.
Then comes 2026. Twenty years after signing the bond documents, the final repayment leaves your account. The debt has been cleared, the property now belongs entirely to you.
At the same time, monthly rent has increased to around N$8 000. Every month that income arrives without a mortgage payment attached to it. The difference is significant.
For twenty years, N$4 000 went to the bank every month and over twenty years, that adds up to approximately N$960 000. A very nice profit to the bank. At first glance,
paying nearly a million Namibia dollars for a property that originally cost N$400 000 may seem difficult to justify.
However, that is only one side of the story. Over the same period, rental income increased gradually from about N$2 500 per month to around N$8 000 per month.
The estimated cumulative rental income amounts to roughly N$1.1 million. This means the tenant contributed more to the property than you paid to the bank. The cost of building that asset was funded through rental income 100%.
That reality is often overlooked when people discuss the price of property ownership. There is another factor that deserves attention.
The rental income may stop if a tenant moves out. Repairs may be needed. There will always be rates, levies, insurance and maintenance expenses. Property ownership is not effortless.
Yet twenty years later, the townhouse still exists. It has value. A modest property purchased for N$400 000 in 2006 is now worth approximately N$1 million, if you took care of it. You own an asset that is fully paid for. You receive about N$8 000 per month in rent and there is no mortgage attached to it.
The property can be occupied, rented out, used as security, or eventually passed on to your children. That is where the real lesson sits.
Many people spend years searching for the perfect investment, the perfect opportunity, or the perfect moment to begin. In reality, wealth often grows in far less dramatic ways.
It grows when someone commits to an asset that produces value over long periods of time.
Looking back from 2026, it is an obvious decision, yet in 2046, you will look back at a similar article, thinking the same. And perhaps there is one more point worth remembering.
The “friend” who rented from you during those twenty years was solving his housing need. At the same time, he was helping fund the creation of an asset that remains long
after the bond has been repaid. Sometimes the biggest difference between an owner and a renter is not income, intelligence or luck.
It is simply who took the first step when the opportunity appeared. By my estimations, this same property will produce N$25 000-28 000 in rental income in 20 years’ time, yet some people will tell you that paying N$10 000 per month today to the bank is not smart.
Just wait, they will be the ones paying your mortgage. If you still don’t believe me, look at all the successful individuals in your life. Do they rent or do they own?
*Ian Coffee is the Chief Operations Officer at Envoy Global Namibia
