Frequently asked questions
The questions people actually ask before joining — including the awkward ones about risk and protection. If yours is not here, ask us.
A cooperative is a commercial enterprise owned and run jointly by its members, who share in the profits or benefits. In the tradition of the cooperative movement, members hold to the ethical values of honesty, openness, social responsibility and caring for others.
UK ULDA is constituted around the Co-operative Principles defined by the International Co-operative Alliance: voluntary and open membership, democratic member control, member economic participation, autonomy and independence, education and training, cooperation among cooperatives, and concern for the community. Those principles are written into Article 3 of our constitution, and that article is entrenched — changing it requires the approval of 100% of members.
Yes. ULDA & Partners Cooperative Ltd is registered at Companies House in England & Wales under company number 11728901, incorporated on 14 December 2018 as a private company limited by guarantee without share capital. You can read the public record on the Companies House register without taking our word for any of it.
Our board is named in full on the leadership page, and our complete constitution — all 118 articles — is published on this site.
They are two separate companies with two separate jobs.
UK ULDA — ULDA & Partners Cooperative Ltd — is the UK cooperative registered at Companies House. It raises and holds member capital, and approves the business case for each project in London.
ULDA — Universal Learn Direct Academia Ltd — is a separate company registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission in Nigeria. It trains the construction workforce and executes the projects on the ground.
You become a member of the UK cooperative. It is the UK entity you have a relationship with.
Membership is open to any individual aged 16 or over, and to corporate bodies and the nominees of unincorporated bodies, firms and partnerships, who support the aims of the cooperative and agree to pay the monthly subscription. Every application is approved by the directors (Article 12).
A corporate body that joins appoints a representative by resolution of its governing body, and that representative exercises the member’s rights (Article 13).
The constitution sets no residency requirement — it requires that you are 16 or over, support the aims of the cooperative, and pay the subscription. In practice most members are UK-based, and the cooperative is governed by UK law with general meetings convened under the Companies Act 2006.
If you are applying from outside the UK, say so in your application and we will confirm what that means for you before your membership is approved.
Membership is a monthly subscription of a minimum of £100 and a maximum of £500 (Article 7). You choose your amount within that range when you apply.
Members who default on the minimum £100 monthly contribution for two consecutive months cease to be members under Article 17(a), so treat the commitment as an ongoing one rather than a one-off payment.
We do not publish a projected or guaranteed return, and you should be sceptical of any property scheme that does.
What the constitution commits us to is the structure: the cooperative exists to raise member funds and invest them in Nigerian real estate projects for profit, exclusively with our execution partner ULDA (Article 4). Every project must have a business case approved in London before any money is disbursed, and that business case must set out both the financial return and the social return.
Your capital is at risk. Property development returns depend on delivery, on the Nigerian property market and on currency movement, and projected performance is not a promise. Read the constitution in full before you apply.
It is worth being precise about what the protections are and what they are not.
What you have: a UK-registered company limited by guarantee, filing publicly at Companies House; a written constitution that restricts what the cooperative may spend money on (Article 4); one member, one vote on every question at a general meeting (Article 44, also entrenched); at least five general meetings a year; annual accounts and an auditor’s report put to the AGM; and a requirement that disposing of assets worth a third or more of the balance sheet needs a special resolution of the members.
What you do not have: this is an investment in a cooperative, not a bank deposit. It is not covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme. Your capital is at risk and you may get back less than you put in.
No funds are disbursed to a project until its business case has been approved in London. That business case has to state the financial return and also the socio-economic return — the skills empowerment, the skills upgrades, and the direct and indirect employment the project will generate.
Members exercise control through general meetings. The cooperative holds an AGM plus at least four further general meetings every year, specifically so that members can participate in decision-making and review the business planning and management process (Article 22).
Membership gives you the opportunity to own a home or to grow a property portfolio, and we work with the Mortgage Banking Association of Nigeria so that member banks can pre-qualify eligible buyers for our developments.
Membership and home purchase are separate transactions. Being a member does not by itself allocate you a unit — talk to us about the current developments and what is available.
You can resign at any time by giving notice in writing to the Secretary (Article 17(c)). Membership also ends automatically if you default on the minimum monthly contribution as described above.
Membership rights and privileges are not transferable and cannot be sold or assigned to someone else, except to a member’s estate on death (Article 18).
A member can also be expelled, but only by special resolution and only after at least 21 days’ written notice and an opportunity to make representations to the meeting, in person or through a representative (Article 19).
More than a subscription. Members agree to attend general meetings and take an active interest in the operation and development of the cooperative and its business, and to respect the confidentiality of its business decisions (Article 14).
In return the cooperative commits to explaining what the role of a member is, training you in the skills needed to participate, providing ongoing education in cooperative values, and making general meetings accessible (Articles 15 and 16).
By counting it. Social return is written into every project business case as a measurable quantity rather than a statement of intent: how many youths are trained on the project, how many artisans are upskilled into gainful employment, and how much direct and indirect employment the development creates.
We publish figures once they are verified rather than estimating them.
Complete the membership application on this site. It takes about five minutes and covers your personal details, the contribution you propose to make, and the declarations required by the constitution.
We acknowledge every application by email straight away. Applications are approved by the directors, and we will contact you about setting up your contribution once your application has been considered — payment details are never collected through the website form.
Still deciding?
Read the constitution — it is the document that actually governs what we can and cannot do with members’ money. Then ask us anything it leaves unclear.
Put your capital to work where it builds something
Membership starts at £100 a month. Your contribution is pooled with other members, invested in housing projects approved in London and built in Nigeria, and measured on both financial and social return.