Ghana puts no restrictions on the foreigners in terms of buying property. However, there are different kinds of lands, a few of which cannot be privately owned by the foreigners alone.

The property in Ghana has four different types:

• Government land
• Vested land
• Customary/stool land
• Family/private land

In order to acquire government land or vested land, a person is required to file an application with the Executive Secretary of Lands Commission or the Regional Lands Officer. The location of the land is another factor which is taken into consideration. Customary land in the country belongs to different stool who entertain the authority to grand a specific customary land for which they are also held responsible. The Constitution of 1992 has laid down a rule that there must not be any free hold interest granted in terms of buying customary land.

All the pieces of customary land which is granted to the private individuals or families prior to the Constitution of 1992 are now addressed as the private land and these are owned by the private individuals. For this particular case, the buyer is required to go directly to the owner of the land in order to buy the same.

Acquiring a property in Ghana requires an appointment of a real estate agent and a lawyer. A search of the title is considered to be very important in order to figure out the ownership as well as the kind of the land which the buyer shows an interest in buying. Once all the important paperwork and agreements have been settled, a Deed of Conveyance or any suitable instrument of transfer/indenture is prepared by the lawyer.

The process is then followed by signing the agreement after which the title is transferred to the buyer. The buyer then pays the amount of the property. The documents required to be shown during this particular registration process includes the document of identification as well as the contacts of the employers if the lease agreement is under your name.

The title of the property is registered at the Lands Commission Secretariat. This whole procedure of registration takes a period of 48 days to accomplish. It requires a total of five procedures. The stamp duty in the country is levied upon the value of the property at certain progressive rates ranging from 0.25 to 1 percent respectively. Landlords in Ghana request an advance rent payment, however, no refundable security deposit.