Young people in Maio face an uphill struggle to buy a first home as supply all but disappears

Few houses, and none for sale

Finding a home for sale in Morrinho or Porto Inglês is very nearly a stroke of luck.

The financing hurdle

A modest home costs between 2,000,000 and 4,000,000 CVE, a stretch on local wages.

Renting is no easier

Flats to rent are just as scarce as those on the market to buy.

Emigration as a safety valve

Maio has one of the highest rates of young people leaving anywhere in the country.

A property market at a near standstill

In Maio, the shortage of homes for sale owes less to strong demand than to the near-total absence of new supply, with residential construction on the island having stood virtually still for years. Residents of Porto Inglês explain that the few homes that do come onto the market are usually sold by direct agreement between families, without ever being publicly advertised, which narrows the options for young first-time buyers still further.

Banks and guarantors, an added obstacle

The financial institutions operating in Cabo Verde demand guarantors and deposits that are hard to put together for workers whose wages depend on tourism or local government, the main sources of employment in Maio. Several young people interviewed said that even with savings of their own, the lack of an additional guarantee from a relative on a stable income is usually the reason their loan applications are turned down, forcing them to postpone buying a home indefinitely.

Emigration as the only real alternative

Faced with this outlook, a large share of Maio's young people choose to move to Praia, to other islands or abroad, repeating a pattern that already shaped earlier generations on the island. Local authorities acknowledge that halting this outflow will inevitably mean making housing easier to obtain, though municipal resources for developing public land remain very limited compared with economically weightier islands such as Santiago or Sal.

Calls for dedicated schemes

Youth groups in Maio have asked the government to launch social housing schemes tailored to the particular circumstances of a small island with little building activity, along the lines of those already running elsewhere in the country. The proposals include microcredit facilities on more flexible terms and the transfer of municipal public land for assisted self-build, although so far no specific initiative has produced visible results.