The Role of Estate Surveyors and Valuers in Curbing Arbitrary Rental Increments in Asaba Metropolis, Delta State, Nigeria

This study examines how practising estate surveyors and valuers (ESVs) understand and endorse their professional responsibilities in curbing arbitrary rental increments in Asaba Metropolis, and the factors that constrain their implementation. A cross-sectional questionnaire survey recorded 200 submissions; 187 were classified as eligible practitioners and 170 passed an attention check. Descriptive statistics, reliability diagnostics and exploratory ordinal logistic regression were reported. Of the primary sample, 68.2% perceived arbitrary increments as prevalent. Respondents endorsed mediation (74.7%), professional valuation (72.4%) and fee-scale benchmarking (71.2%) as relevant functions. However, weak enforcement of tenancy laws (74.7%), landlords bypassing ESVs for unregistered agents (69.4%) and inadequate rental-market data (65.9%) were prominent constraints. The regression showed no statistically significant joint association between selected role perceptions and perceived prevalence (LR χ²(7) = 3.07, p = .878). The findings suggest a gap between recognition of professional responsibilities and the conditions required to implement them; they do not measure actual rent reductions or intervention effectiveness.