The growing economic opportunities in small and big African cities have seen the exodus of a
good part of population, especially young from rural areas. This creates a housing problem in cities not only
in terms of quantities but also in terms of quality.The problem of housing affordability is an important
handicap for countries to achieve some of Millennium Developments goals in terms of Poverty Eradication
and Environmental Sustainability. This research conducted in Rwanda comes in line with support to some of
government and cities strategies and policies, such as Vision 2020, Economic Development and Poverty
Reduction Strategy (EDPRS I and II) on land use, infrastructure development, etc. It is proposing the
possibility of planning and designing residential affordable apartments or single family houses (SFH) to
people living in Rwandan cities without going against approved cities’ Master Plan. The work consists in the
detailed analysis of the site, Building Materials, and Structural systems suitable to the site conditions. It was
established that comparing with the actual building costs on the markets, the engineering consideration of
above three factors may reduce the building cost in 3 – 6 times.