Buying an apartment as a foreigner is not simply a question of whether you can afford the advertised price. In a sectional-title or condominium building, the buyer is purchasing two things at the same time: a private unit and a legal relationship with the rest of the building. That second part carries obligations for service charges, insurance, repairs, common property, management decisions and sometimes restrictions on renting or resale. A beautiful apartment can therefore become an expensive mistake even where the seller genuinely owns it.

This guide focuses on Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and mainland Tanzania. The legal systems use different names, but the practical question is similar. Before money changes hands, a foreign buyer should establish what title is being acquired, whether the building has been lawfully divided into separately transferable units, what debts or restrictions attach to the unit, who controls the common property, and what taxes arise on purchase and later resale. The four countries should not be treated as if they have one regional property law.

Why the apartment title matters more than the brochure

The first document to understand is not the marketing brochure but the registered title and the plan that legally identifies the unit. A developer may describe a flat by floor, view, parking space and square metres, but legal ownership depends on what the land registry recognizes. The buyer should therefore match the physical apartment to the registered sectional or condominium plan, the unit number, the floor area, any parking or storage entitlement, and the underlying land tenure. The buyer should also identify whether a balcony, parking bay, garden, roof area or corridor is part of the private unit, common property, or common property granted for exclusive use. Those distinctions affect control, repair costs and resale value.

The second file is the building's governance record. Service charges are not merely an annual nuisance. They are the mechanism through which owners pay for lifts, security, cleaning, generators, insurance, structural repairs and other shared obligations. Before signing, a buyer should obtain the current budget, recent financial statements, minutes of owners' meetings, the management agreement, insurance information and a written statement of any arrears affecting the apartment. A low purchase price can be misleading if a major roof, lift, facade or water-system repair is about to be funded by owners.

Kenya: a foreign buyer receives leasehold, not freehold

Kenya's Constitution is unusually clear. Article 65 provides that a non-citizen may hold land only on leasehold tenure, and the lease cannot exceed ninety-nine years. A company is treated as a Kenyan citizen for this purpose only if it is wholly owned by Kenyan citizens. This means that forming a locally registered company with foreign shareholders does not convert a foreign buyer into a citizen landholder.

For apartments, the Sectional Properties Act, 2020 is central. It allows a building to be divided into individual units, with a separate register and certificate of title or certificate of lease for each unit. A sectional unit also carries its proportionate share in the common property. The Act requires the sectional plan to identify the unit, approximate floor area, unit factor and permitted use, and it requires county approval confirming the building division. A foreign buyer should therefore verify the certificate of lease for the specific apartment, the registered sectional plan and the remaining term of the underlying lease. A long lease may sound secure, but an apartment with a much shorter unexpired term may be harder to finance or resell.

The building corporation is equally important. Under the Sectional Properties Act, the corporation maintains an administrative fund and raises contributions from owners in proportion to their unit entitlements. The Act also gives a purchaser a practical due-diligence right: on written request, the corporation must provide specified information, including contributions due on a unit, pending claims or judgments against the corporation, management agreements, budgets, financial statements, by-laws and meeting minutes. A buyer who skips this step is effectively agreeing to join a financial arrangement without reading its accounts.

Where the apartment is being bought from a developer, section 43 requires the developer to give the purchaser documents including the purchase agreement, by-laws, any management or recreational agreement, the parcel or unit title, information on charges affecting the title and the sectional plan. These documents should be reviewed before the deposit becomes commercially difficult to recover.

Tax should be budgeted separately from the price. Kenya's Stamp Duty Act places stamp duty on the purchaser or transferee. For immovable property, the rate is generally 4 percent within a municipality and 2 percent outside a municipality. On resale, Kenya Revenue Authority states that capital gains tax is 15 percent of the net gain and is payable by the person transferring the property, subject to statutory exemptions. The buyer should also check current county rates, land rent where applicable, registration fees and any tax clearance requirements before completion.

Uganda: check the unit title and the condominium debts

Uganda also restricts the tenure available to foreigners. Section 40 of the Land Act provides that a non-citizen may acquire a lease but not mailo or freehold land, and the lease cannot exceed ninety-nine years. In a condominium development, that means a foreign purchaser should expect a leasehold interest in the unit where the underlying land is not available to the purchaser on a citizen tenure.

The Condominium Property Act is especially useful for due diligence because it identifies the documents that a developer must provide. Before selling a unit or proposed unit, the developer must deliver the sale agreement, proposed rules, management agreement, recreational agreement, the lease where the parcel is leasehold, the unit title, details of charges affecting the title and the condominium plan. The Act also gives a purchaser a ten-day right to rescind after execution unless the required documents were delivered at least ten days before signing. For an off-plan buyer, this is more than formality. It creates a legal reason to insist that the project's title and management structure exist on paper before relying on a sales presentation.

Service-charge exposure should be checked directly with the condominium corporation or managing agent. The Act permits contributions for management and common expenses according to the unit factor, and unpaid contributions can become a registered charge against the unit. A managing agent must, on proper request and payment of the prescribed fee, provide information including contributions due and certain claims or judgments involving the corporation. Before completion, the sale agreement should therefore require the seller to clear all contributions and produce a current certificate or statement confirming the account.

Uganda Revenue Authority currently states that transfers of land attract stamp duty at 1.5 percent of the value determined by the Government valuer. Resale taxation is more fact-sensitive than in Kenya. Uganda does not operate a separate capital gains tax statute; gains on business assets and certain commercial or income-producing property are brought into income tax. A foreign owner who has used the apartment as a rental or business asset should obtain tax advice before resale instead of assuming that a private-home exemption or a fixed capital-gains rate applies.

Rwanda: one residential condominium unit is the key starting point

Rwanda's rules require a foreign buyer to pay particular attention to the purpose and number of properties being acquired. Ministerial Instructions issued in February 2023 state that a foreigner has rights to an emphyteutic lease for a residential house. They also provide that if a foreigner intends to possess more than one unit in a condominium building, an investment business plan approved by the competent authority is required. For an ordinary foreign residential buyer, the safe starting assumption is therefore one residential condominium unit unless the investment route has been properly approved.

Rwanda's Law creating and organizing Condominiums makes the apartment and its share of common elements a separately registrable immovable property. It also creates an association of co-owners responsible for administration, maintenance and communal services. The association may determine obligatory fees according to the owner's participation share and may pursue owners who fail to pay. Common elements include such things as the land, walls, roof, stairs, halls, lifts and shared engineering systems.

One provision deserves special attention during a resale. Article 22 states that a new owner takes over the former owner's rights and obligations in the condominium. It further provides that the parties should specify how outstanding utility and service debts will be settled; otherwise those debts are payable by the purchaser. That makes a written clearance from the association and utility providers one of the most important closing documents in Rwanda. The buyer should not rely on the seller's verbal statement that 'everything is paid.'

Tax also continues after registration. Rwanda Revenue Authority states that immovable-property tax depends on the use and characteristics of the property, with specific rates for residential property and special treatment for some multi-storey residential buildings. RRA also lists one building intended by its owner as a dwelling among statutory exemptions, so the correct classification should be confirmed rather than assumed. On a later sale, Rwanda also imposes a tax on the sale of immovable property. RRA currently states that a 2.5 percent rate applies to a seller not registered for income tax, after deduction of the exempt FRW 5,000,000 portion of sale value, while a different 2 percent rule applies to commercial-use property sold by an income-tax-registered taxpayer.

Mainland Tanzania: do not assume a unit title removes the foreign-ownership restriction

Mainland Tanzania requires the greatest caution. The Land Act provides that a non-citizen may not be allocated or granted land unless it is for investment purposes under the investment framework. The Tanzania Investment Centre explains that foreign investors generally access land for investment through derivative rights, rather than an ordinary granted right of occupancy held in the same way as a citizen. A person who simply wants a holiday or residential apartment should therefore not assume that paying the price and receiving a unit-title document is enough. The proposed ownership structure must first be checked against the Land Act and the current investment rules.

The Unit Titles Act, 2008, now published in revised form as Chapter 416, provides the legal machinery for dividing buildings into units in mainland Tanzania. It recognizes separate unit titles, co-ownership of common property and associations of co-owners. The Act requires by-laws dealing with the use and upkeep of private and common areas and the assessment and collection of contributions to common expenses. A unit owner may transfer the unit, but that right remains subject to other written law. For a foreign purchaser, the Unit Titles Act and the Land Act must therefore be read together.

Due diligence should confirm the unit title, registered unit plan, the right under which the underlying land is held, the association's registration and by-laws, current service-charge account, insurance, planned major works and any mortgage or other registered interest. Where the transaction depends on an investment approval or derivative right, that approval should be treated as a condition of completion, not as paperwork to be solved after the purchase price has been paid.

Tanzania's Stamp Duty Act also makes the transfer price only part of the closing cost. Its conveyance schedule applies ad valorem stamp duty, including 0.5 percent on the first TSh 100,000 and 1 percent on value above that threshold. A later disposal can also create income-tax liability on the realization of an investment asset such as land or a building, with the treatment differing between resident and non-resident sellers. Because the foreigner's underlying right may itself depend on investment status, tax and land-law advice should be coordinated before resale.

The practical closing rule: buy the building records, not only the apartment

Across these four jurisdictions, the best due-diligence question is not 'does the seller have a title?' but 'what exactly will I own, what will I owe after completion, and what could prevent me from selling later?' The answer should come from five connected records: the unit title and land tenure, the registered sectional or condominium plan, the corporation or association documents, the financial and service-charge records, and the public approvals and tax position.

The management company should also be investigated separately from the owners' corporation or association. A private manager may collect service charges and run the building day to day, but its authority comes from a contract and the governing documents. The buyer should know who appointed it, the length of the contract, how fees can be increased, whether owners can replace it, whether major repairs require owner approval, and who controls the service-charge bank account. These questions often matter more to the cost of ownership than the marble in the lobby.

Finally, the purchase agreement should convert due diligence into enforceable closing conditions. It should identify the exact unit and parking or storage rights, state the tenure and remaining lease term, require discharge of seller mortgages and service-charge arrears, allocate taxes and registration costs, require delivery of vacant possession where promised, and make any foreign-investment or regulatory approval a condition where the law requires it. If the buyer intends to rent the apartment, the by-laws, planning use and any short-term letting restrictions should be checked before completion, not after a tenant has been found.

A foreign apartment purchase can be legally straightforward, but only when the private unit, the shared building and the foreigner's permitted land interest all fit together. The cheapest price is rarely the best measure of risk. The more useful figure is the total legal cost of owning, managing and eventually reselling the unit.

Source note. This article was prepared from current public legal and official materials checked for 3 September 2026, including the Constitution of Kenya 2010, Kenya's Sectional Properties Act and Sectional Properties Regulations, the Stamp Duty Act and Kenya Revenue Authority guidance; Uganda's Land Act, Condominium Property Act and Uganda Revenue Authority guidance; Rwanda's 2023 Ministerial Instructions on possession of residential land by a foreigner, the Law creating and organizing Condominiums, Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority guidance and Rwanda Revenue Authority guidance; and, for mainland Tanzania, the Land Act, Unit Titles Act, Stamp Duty Act, Tanzania Investment Centre guidance and the Income Tax Act. Tanzania references in this article concern mainland Tanzania, not Zanzibar.

Suggested citation:

Ronald Serwanga, "Apartment Buying Guide for Foreigners - East Africa" East Africa Legal Insight (3 September 2026).