How to avoid scam when purchasing land in Ghana

Head of Land Registration Division at the Tema District Lands Commission, Nana Kojo Essilfie Esq., has provided a useful guide to avoiding scams when acquiring a piece of land in Ghana.

According to him, the most important thing for anyone to do when purchasing land is to inspect the land before making any purchase.

“It is good to actually see the land because in this country, people have sold land to others when they have never seen the land and they claim to have done some form of registration and after several years they try to go visit the lands and they realize that what was sold to them was in the sea.

It has happened before so the first thing to do is to actually go see for yourself”, he explained on the ‘Fact Sheet’ Show with Samuel Eshun under the theme Understanding Ghana’s New Land Act.

He added that after the inspection is carried out, there is the need to employ the services of a licensed surveyor who “prepares for you a site plan of the particular land.”

“The law provides that the site plan must be signed or endorsed by the director of survey and mapping division of the Lands Commission to ensure that the plan has been prepared for you and has gone through some rigorous checks”, he added.

Nana Kojo also notes that some checks are conducted at the Lands Commission after which it is brought before the Customary Land Secretariat where land transactions will be recorded.

Ghana’s new Land Act, 2020 (Act 1036) (“the Land Act”) brings innovation to the land administration in the country by helping to inform the public about their rights and interests in acquiring and possessing land; by improving the tenure security of interests in land ownership; and by enhancing public accountability in land administration.