The government has rolled out plans to register landlords within Nairobi County in a move to raise more money to finance the 2023/24 budget.

President William Ruto's administration, which wants to increase the country's tax base, highlighted the real estate sector as one of the finance avenues worth exploiting. 

The registration exercise is set to commence on Wednesday, October 18.

Additionally, landlords in other areas within the Nairobi metropolis, such as Syokimau in Machakos, will participate in the exercise.

Affordable Housing project in Kiambu launched by government spokesperson Cyrus Oguna on Wednesday, February 23, 2022

GOVERNMENT SPOKESPERSON

Further, landlords targeted for the exercise were urged to cooperate with government officials by availing all relevant documents. 

"The taxman officers conducting the exercise will identify themselves using their identification cards which can be verified by dialing the USSD code *572#, " read the notice in part.

As per government regulations, landlords are expected to pay rental income tax totalling 10 per cent of the gross rent tenants pay.

The taxman wants to prevent cases where property owners evade paying taxes to the government and further wants to seal all loopholes. 

Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua recently revealed that the new administration was looking for more avenues of raising funds without increasing taxes on commodities.

Additionally, increasing the tax base was one of the issues that took centre stage during campaigns prior to the August 9 polls.

"The president and I sat with the taxman for seven hours, and we parted at midnight to agree on how we'll collect more revenue.

"We want to collect about Ksh3 trillion by end of the year to fund our current and development budget," Gachagua stated.