DURBAN - The Managing Director of Seeff Berea, Roger Hoaten, has reported that the property market in KwaZulu-Natal has fared well in 2018 compared to 2017.
He said, "Current sales figures from Seeff licensees in the KZN province show that there has been a 9% increase in value for the first half of 2018 compared to 2017".
Brett Botsis, Sales Director and Licensee of Seeff Umhlanga highlighted the factors that could have contributed to the positive state of the KZN property market on 2018.
This Musgrave Road property is on the market for R7 million Photo: Supplied
Botsis said that the recent interest rate cut to 6,5% was welcomed by the South African property market and it provided an opportunity for growth. It also encouraged more people to get involved in the property sector.
Another factor that contributed to the positive state of the KZN property market for 2018 is an inflow of new developments in across the Umhlanga region including Sibiya.
Botsis said, "This has brought additional new retail stores and restaurants into our region and most businesses have now migrated to Umhlanga Ridge and Ridgeside originally from the CBD or Westville".
This Granleigh Crescent property is on the market for R6,95 million Photo: Supplied
However, 2017 was not a good year and a lot is expected from this year especially after the political change that took place at the end of 2017. According to Hoaten, we are now in a buyer's market and although it was easy to sell during a seller's market because there would be a lot of buyers competing for a limited amount of properties, the opposite happens during a buyer's market.
On a buyer's market, Hoaten said that there are more property listings for the seller to compete with fewer buyers that are interested in properties. The result is that it takes longer to sell with some statistics showing that it takes KZN up to 21 weeks to sell an average property while in Pretoria it would only take 11 weeks.
This Kildare Road property is on the market for R6,95 million Photo: Supplied
Accordng to Botsis, the coastal regions of the province have made extraordinary progress with Seeff Umhlanga recently recording a 31% growth (March 2017 vs March 2018) in their sales figures.
The second half of 2018 is expected to perform better based on historical annual statistics and if complete confidence returns to the market then huge increases in sales will be seen.