Cape Town's Residential Property Values still the best in SA.

A survey recently carried out by the respected property analysts, Lightstone, has come up with a range of statistics that will be of interest to anyone keeping track of property trends in South Africa today, says Rowan Alexander, Director of Alexander Swart Property, the Cape Town estate agency headquartered at Brackenfell.

Lightstone, he says, calculate that of the eight million registered properties in SA, 83% are residential and these 6,7 million homes have a combined value of R5,4 trillion, with Gauteng accounting for some R2 trillion of this figure. Sixty-seven per cent of the total are freehold properties, 18,3% are in estates (a figure almost double that of 15 years ago) and14,2% are sectional title units. The average value of the estate homes is roughly three times that of normal freehold properties.

Gauteng remains the province with the densest residential properties as regards value and volume but the figures for SA's municipalities show that Cape Town's values are way ahead of the rest with residential properties worth R1,6 trillion. Johannesburg comes second with R0, 94 trillion and Tshwane third, with R0,54 trillion.

The number of homes in the Western Cape and Gauteng together is just over 50% of the total value for the country but in value terms these two provinces account for 66% of South Africa's homes. In Johannesburg Bryanston, Morningside and Midstream are the highest overall value suburbs while in Cape Town Sea Point, Rondebosch and Fresnaye have captured the most value.  Llandudno has the highest value per home-R19,3 million. The far less expensive middle bracket Cape Town areas of Sillwood Heights, Hospital Hill and Voelklip saw the highest price growth in the last year.

Lightstone's survey also reveals that single female residential buyers  in Cape Town have increased  in one year to just over 71, 700, a figure which is almost 15% higher than that of their male counterparts.

"The Lighstone data," says Alexander, "confirm yet again that Cape Town remains a favoured precinct for property investment-with greater stability and, on average, steadier growth than other metropolitan areas. Prices here continue to be well above the average for South Africa. The formerly under-valued Northern Suburbs have fared particularly well recently and justified investors' confidence.