Most Nigerian bank product pages ask you to trust that something Islamic is happening underneath. The Alternative Bank's Alternative Asset Finance does something rarer: it names its contract. Ijarah, on the page, with the bank buying the asset, retaining ownership and leasing it against rentals. That candor, plus the strongest Shariah disclosure regime in the market, earns this product a serious look from anyone financing a car or equipment. The economics deserve an equally serious interrogation. Verified from AltBank's pages and FY2024 annual report, August 4, 2026.
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How it works
AltBank purchases the asset you want, a car, household equipment, machinery, even a home, and leases it to you. You pay rentals for usage while the bank carries genuine ownership risk; ownership can transfer to you at the end. Because there is no principal accruing interest, a late rental cannot compound into a bigger debt. The product is positioned to minimize upfront outlay so customers can conserve capital, and applications run through the bank's app or a relationship manager. Takaful-based cover applies across the bank's financing stack. The Advisory Committee of Experts, Shaykh AbdulKader Thomas (chairman), Hon. Justice AbdurRaheem Ahmad Sayi and Shaykh Abubakar Muhammad Musa, certifies the bank's products in a signed, FRC-numbered annual report inside the audited accounts, a disclosure practice no other Nigerian bank matches.
The pricing question, answered sideways
Retail rates and tenors are quoted individually and are not published. But AltBank does publish the terms of this product's SME sibling, AltLease: up to N20,000,000 per obligor, a markup rate of 30% per annum (explicitly not flat), a 30% commitment deposit, and a 24-month maximum tenor. That is the only public rental-pricing signal in Nigerian halal vehicle finance, and until AltBank quotes you otherwise, it is the rational anchor for what retail Ijarah pricing looks like at this bank. Thirty percent per annum over a short tenor is expensive money; over 24 months it approaches a cost of finance that only strongly productive assets justify. Get the retail quote, compare it against Lotus Rides' unpublished but negotiable Murabaha, and let the numbers decide.
The published record
| Term | Detail |
|---|---|
| Structure | Ijarah (named on the page; bank retains ownership) |
| Assets covered | Cars, household equipment, machinery, homes |
| Retail pricing | Quoted individually; not published |
| SME sibling (AltLease) | N20m cap, 30% p.a. markup, 30% deposit, 24 months |
| Insurance | Takaful-based cover across the financing stack |
| Shariah certification | Signed, FRC-numbered annual ACE report |
Strengths and weaknesses
- Strength: the contract is named and the structure is genuinely defensible: real bank ownership, rentals for usage, no compounding.
- Strength: one coherent framework across cars, equipment and household assets instead of a maze of sub-products.
- Strength: the market's best Shariah governance disclosure, signed and audited.
- Weakness: no retail rate card, and the published SME sibling runs a steep 30% per annum.
- Weakness: bank ownership during the lease means usage restrictions until transfer; understand them before signing.
- Weakness: if the SME pattern (24 months, 30% deposit) extends to retail, tenors are short and the upfront commitment is heavy.
Verdict
Best-documented structure in the market, potentially the priciest execution: that is the honest summary. For a buyer who values a named, clean Ijarah and negotiates the rental hard, AltBank is a credible route to a car or equipment, backed by governance you can actually inspect. For a buyer optimizing purely on cost, the 30% SME benchmark says: get competing quotes before you sign anything. The full market comparison is in our halal car financing guide, and AltBank's business-side products are reviewed in the AltLease and AltBiz coverage.
The negotiation, step by step
Because retail pricing is quoted individually, the application is a negotiation, and the customer who treats it as one does better. First, arrive with the AltLease grid in hand: 30% per annum on a 30% deposit over 24 months is what this bank publicly charges businesses for the same structure, and a retail quote should have to explain itself against that anchor. Second, demand the offer letter as one complete document: the full rental schedule in naira, the deposit, the takaful premium and who pays it, the early-termination mechanics, and the exact ownership-transfer mechanism at the end of the lease. Third, ask the two questions an Ijarah makes fair: who bears major maintenance as owner, and what happens to rentals if the asset is stolen or written off. A bank that names its contract on the marketing page should be willing to defend the contract's logic clause by clause.
The governance record behind the product
AltBank's Shariah governance is unusually verifiable for this market. Its Advisory Committee of Experts signs an annual compliance report inside the bank's audited accounts, and those accounts show a financing book structured as trade and lease assets rather than an interest loan book. That does not price your lease, but it does mean the institution's non-interest character is documented at audit level rather than asserted at marketing level, which is more than several competitors can show. The gap sits at product level: no per-product certification is published for Alternative Asset Finance itself, so ask for the product's approval documentation at the branch. Institutions with real governance can usually produce it.
Frequently asked questions
How does this product differ from AltLease?
Same structural family, different doors. AltLease is the SME product: published 30% per annum, 30% commitment deposit, 24-month cap, N20 million per obligor, for registered businesses financing productive assets. Alternative Asset Finance is the retail door: individually quoted terms, a wider asset range that includes household equipment and homes, and eligibility built around confirmed employment. If you run a registered business, quote both routes; the published SME terms give you the rare luxury of a number to negotiate against inside the same institution.
Can I end the lease early?
The public page does not say, and in an Ijarah the answer matters more than in a Murabaha: since you are paying for usage rather than repaying a fixed price, a clean early exit should stop future rentals rather than accelerate them. Get the early-termination clause in the offer letter with its costs stated, and ask specifically whether early purchase of the asset is priced in advance or negotiated at the time. The difference between those two answers is worth real money if your circumstances improve mid-term.
Is the 30% AltLease benchmark a fair proxy for the retail quote?
Treat it as a calibration, not a prediction. Retail underwriting differs from SME underwriting: a salaried applicant with domiciled income is arguably lower risk than a small business, which cuts toward a better rate, while smaller ticket sizes and consumer servicing costs cut the other way. The honest use of the benchmark is as a challenge: a retail quote implying far more than 30% per annum deserves a written justification, and one meaningfully below it deserves a careful read of the fees and deposit to find where the difference went.
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See side-by-side comparisons of Shariah-compliant products, or let our matcher recommend the best options for your situation.
What assets will the bank actually lease?
The published scope is broad: vehicles, household equipment, machinery and homes all appear on the bank's pages, with the home variant carrying its own published terms (the N80 million property cap and 10-year tenor covered in our home finance review). In practice, expect the bank to favor assets with verifiable invoices, clean title and a resale market, since it owns the asset throughout the lease. An unusual or hard-to-value asset is not necessarily refused, but it will be priced like the risk it is.