Most development failures in Eko Atlantic City share a common origin: questions that were not asked early enough. In fifteen years of working in EAC — including delivering Azuri Towers, the Marina District's flagship mixed-use complex — I have seen the same mistakes made repeatedly by otherwise sophisticated developers. They are not mistakes of ambition. They are mistakes of sequence.
These seven questions will not guarantee success. But failing to answer them honestly, before committing capital, makes failure significantly more likely.
1. Have you confirmed your plot boundaries with South Energyx directly?
This sounds elementary. It is not. EAC plots are sold with detailed documentation by South Energyx Nigeria Limited, but a significant number of buyers have proceeded with preliminary design work on the basis of approximate coordinates or word-of-mouth plot descriptions. The consequence, discovered at the planning application stage, is that the site cannot accommodate the building they had already designed.
Before any architect is commissioned, obtain your plot's precise survey from South Energyx. Confirm the road frontage, the set-back requirements from the development authority, and whether any utility easements exist within the plot boundary. This is a single meeting and a straightforward documentation exercise. Skipping it costs months.
2. What does your plot's zoning designation actually permit?
EAC has ten districts, and the masterplan prescribes specific uses for each. Residential towers, Grade-A offices, hospitality, retail, and mixed-use are all possible — but not on every plot, and not at every density. The development authority (which operates separately from Lagos State) administers plot ratios, height limits, and the permitted use matrix.
I have seen developers who purchased a plot intending to build a luxury residential tower discover that their zone designation requires a minimum commercial component. The resulting design compromise — or the negotiation required to obtain a variance — added both cost and time. Know your zoning before you know your design.
3. Have you modelled the true construction cost per square metre, including EAC-specific premiums?
Building in EAC carries a meaningful premium over comparable construction on the Lagos mainland. Marine logistics for heavy materials, specialist geotechnical and foundation engineering on reclaimed land, the EAC development authority's overlay approvals, and the cost of maintaining quality standards consistent with the city's positioning — all of these add to cost.
The premium is real and must be modelled honestly. A cost assumption borrowed from a recent Ikoyi project will understate your EAC budget by a margin that can destabilise a project mid-construction. The compensating factor — a premium pricing tier that no other location in Lagos can sustain — justifies the investment if the product is right. But only if the numbers were honest from the start.
4. What is your off-plan sales strategy, and does it close before construction begins?
The Azuri Towers model — and every successful residential development in EAC to date — relied on off-plan sales to reduce equity drawdown and satisfy pre-sale covenants required by construction lenders. The viability of this strategy depends on the product, the pricing, and the sales infrastructure being in place before the first pile is driven.
Too many developers treat sales as a consequence of construction rather than a prerequisite for it. In a market where construction finance is expensive and construction periods are eighteen to thirty months, a project that is 0% pre-sold at construction commencement is a project with a structural problem. Define your pre-sale target, your price point, and your sales agent before you define your construction programme.
5. Do you understand the EAC Development Authority's approval process — not just conceptually, but specifically?
EAC operates under NEPZA (Nigerian Export Processing Zones Authority) regulations, with development control administered by a dedicated authority whose process differs materially from the Lagos State planning system that most Nigerian developers and architects know. The stages, the documentation requirements, the required consultants, and the typical timelines are different.
I have seen projects lose six months at the planning submission stage because the team treated EAC as Lagos State with better roads. It is not. Engage someone who has been through the EAC approval process before — ideally someone who has obtained full building approval, not just a development brief endorsement. The difference between knowing the process conceptually and having navigated it operationally is worth at least one wasted planning cycle.
6. Have you stress-tested your capital stack against an eighteen-month construction delay?
This is not pessimism. It is actuarial hygiene. Construction in EAC — as in any complex urban environment — carries schedule risk. COVID-19 extended programmes across the board. Supply chain disruption, regulatory approvals, specialist sub-contractor availability, and the inevitable design evolution as construction proceeds — any of these can extend a programme by three, six, or twelve months.
The question is not whether you can absorb the planned cost. The question is whether your capital structure can survive eighteen months more expensive than planned, while carrying construction finance at prevailing rates, with sales velocity lower than projected. If the honest answer is no, the capital structure needs to change before construction begins, not after it stalls.
7. Who is your owner's representative during construction, and are they independent?
The owner's representative is the person who sits on your side of the table at every consultant meeting, reads every progress report with scepticism, calls the contractor's programme manager when milestones slip, and tells you the truth about your project's status — including when that truth is uncomfortable.
On Azuri Towers, the separation of advisory and delivery roles was fundamental to how we managed the programme through external shocks. The developer who is also managing the project is conflicted. The contractor who is also self-reporting progress is conflicted. Independent, fee-based programme oversight is not a cost: it is the mechanism by which you find out what is actually happening before it becomes a crisis.
The developer who asks these seven questions honestly, before committing capital, is not a pessimist. They are someone who has learned that optimism is most valuable when it is earned by rigour, not substituted for it.
Makaya Consult provides fee-based advisory services to EAC landowners and developers across each of these seven areas. Every engagement begins with a paid Discovery Workshop that produces a written development strategy document. If you are at the stage of asking these questions, that is where to start.