Home shops here to stay, City says

The City of Windhoek will not compel homeowners to close ‘home shops’ situated on their properties.

Instead, it wants to come up with better regulation to control businesses run from residential properties, it said.

“Given the inherent potential high impact of commercial activities, the council, therefore, has to exercise great caution to ensure that any consent so granted does not negatively affect the rights of other property owners,” the City said.

“A new policy is currently under discussion to appropriately regulate the practice of home shops in residential areas to ensure the necessary balance and benefit to all residents in equal measures,” it added.

The municipality had no intention of closing businesses being run from residential properties, adding that “as a socially minded organisation, [it] has no intention of inhibiting residents strive towards economic freedom”.

“In fact, [the City] has the exact opposite in mind.”

New regulations

The new regulations would soon be completed, it said.

“Accordingly, and as is the case in many cultures in the world, the practice of utilising a single property for the purpose of both residential and commercial use will in the future no longer be a discretionary additional right but is proposed as a primary and permanent land use under the new spatial development framework currently nearing completion.”

Under the new regime, homeowners will be able to divide their residences into different zones, the City said.

“A new land use zoning will therefore be introduced which will not only allow property owners to potentially generate an income from their residential property, but pursuant to the drive towards densification, will also allow for the subdivision and potential selling off a portion to generate necessary capital for further development.”