Nelly Mutungi

Practice Areas

• Structuring of Real Estate Projects and Joint Ventures

• Leases and Licenses

• Due Diligence

• General Corporate & Commercial Law

• Insolvency and Restructuring

Career

Nelly is the Founding Partner of NM Law Advocates LLP and an Advocate of the High Court of Kenya with over 18 years of experience in real estate and commercial property law.

She is particularly recognised for advising on complex and high-value real estate development projects, acting for developers, investors, lenders and corporate occupiers across the full lifecycle of property transactions. Her work spans land acquisition, structuring of development frameworks, joint venture arrangements, project financing support, and transaction execution through to completion.

Nelly has built a strong reputation for structuring large-scale mixed-use and residential developments, advising on subdivision and sectional property arrangements, negotiating development and construction-related agreements, and conducting comprehensive legal due diligence for acquisitions and financing transactions. She is regularly engaged to assess title risk, regulatory compliance exposure and transactional structuring in high-value property investments.

She also advises financial institutions and borrowers on real estate-backed secured lending transactions, including securities structuring, perfection, and enforcement strategy considerations.

In addition to her transactional practice, she undertakes legal audits and institutional legal health checks relating to property portfolios, governance compliance and landholding structures.

Nelly is an accredited Legal and Compliance Auditor, having received accreditation from the Law Society of Kenya and the Capital Markets Authority. She has also completed the training and examinations for Certified Corporate Secretary and is awaiting formal certification.

Clients describe her as technically meticulous, commercially astute and solution-oriented, with a strong ability to anticipate and mitigate risk in complex property transactions.

Professional Memberships

• Law Society of Kenya (LSK)

• East Africa Law Society (Member of the Construction, Projects and Infrastructure Law Committee)

• Member of Women on Boards Network (WOBN)

• Member of Women in Real Estate (WIRE)

• Member of the Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA Kenya)

Education

Experience

Nelly is the Founding and Managing Partner of NM Law Advocates LLP (established 2024) and an Advocate of the High Court of Kenya with over 18 years of experience in real estate, banking and finance, and corporate commercial practice.

She specialises in structuring and negotiating complex real estate development projects, advising developers, landowners, investors and financial institutions across the full lifecycle of property transactions — from acquisition and due diligence to joint venture structuring, financing and completion. She has acted for over 25 commercial banks and financial institutions in secured lending, project finance, asset finance and syndicated lending transactions, and regularly conducts securities audits and loan book reviews to assess enforceability and risk exposure.

Nelly has extensive experience in negotiating development and commercial agreements, structuring hospitality-linked real estate projects involving international operators, and advising on high-value acquisitions and integrated master-planned developments. She is also accredited as a Legal and Compliance Auditor and advises on legal audits, regulatory compliance and corporate governance matters.

Prior to founding NM Law Advocates LLP, she was a Partner and Head of Real Estate and Corporate Commercial at ANL Law Advocates, a Partner at Oraro & Company Advocates, and previously held senior roles at Dentons Hamilton Harrison & Mathews and IKM Advocates (now DLA Piper Africa). She was also seconded to Stephenson Harwood LLP in London, where she gained cross-border corporate and finance transactional experience.

Awards