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With Funsho Arogundade
After conquering banking with his soar away success and stepping down as Chairman of Nigeria’s most profitable lender, Zenith Bank Plc, billionaire magnate, Mr. Jim Ovia is expanding his interest in the luxury segment of Nigeria’s fastest growing real estate industry with two-separate architectural iconic towers rising above the Lagos skyline.
The first is the imposing 26-floor Metropolitan Towers on the ritzy Ozumba Mbadiwe Avenue of Victoria Island, Lagos. Sophisticated and elegant, the Metropolitan Towers is a waterfront living designed to redefine urban luxury within the city’s most exclusive neighbourhood.
Conceived as a serious architectural statement rather than just another high-rise, the Metropolitan Towers consists of 25 floors of glass and steel. It also includes a number of duplex and triplex penthouses in one of Lagos’s most prestigious addresses with land and water access.
Ovia’s second luxury high-rise standing straight on the same Ozumba Mbadiwe waterfront corridor is a 44-unit Quantum Luxury Towers. This architectural masterpiece was built by Cappa & D’Alberto with its interiors handled by DSGN Interior TM —the Swedish Interior architecture and workplace design behind the St Regis Dubai & Waldorf Astoria Riyadh. The structural aspect of these towers has been completed while its delivery for occupancy has been fixed for 2027.
Ovia is simultaneously completing both luxury high-rises where apartments are priced in millions of dollars. Both projects target the ultra-high-net-worth segment of Nigeria’s residential market, a tier that has expanded significantly as dollar-denominated property has become a preferred store of wealth for Nigerian entrepreneurs navigating naira volatility.
On May 5, Ovia stepped down as Zenith Bank Plc Chairman, closing a defining chapter in the 35-year history of the institution he founded. Prior to now, the 74-year-old banking titan has been pumping billions into real estate and quietly building up the premium real estate and hospitality fortune in Lagos.
The Delta State-born billionaire said in a recent interview that real estate is more profitable than banking, and he is backing that conviction with two monumental residential high-rise colouring the Lagos skyline.
