Many residential property franchises in the more remote coastal areas indicate that they have a great deal of stock on hand and, as a result, the market is still very much bent in favourof buyers. Stephen Lubbe, Rawson Properties’ franchisee for the Southern Cape area of George (his territory stretches from Herolds Bay to Wilderness and he deals with certain properties further afield) says, “Buyers are getting houses at a discount of anything from 20 to 40% on what they fetched in the boom of 2007/early 2008. However, there are now far fewer distressed houses on the market today and it is beginning to become evident that the first green shoots of a Southern Cape property recovery are sprouting.”
Anyone buying now, Lubbe believes, will be doing so at the most favourable time because by the end of this year, sale conditions are likely to be very different from the buyer-orientated market they are in now.
Lubbe took over the George franchise in May 2010, at the height of the recession. Despite this, he, in a fairly short space of time, climbed in the sales rankings to be among the top three agencies in the area. Last year his team was steadily selling three to five homes per month and he foresees this picking up over the next few months.
“Right now,” said Lubbe, “we have no less than 480 units on our stock list, but it has to be said that almost all the action is in the R800,000 to R2 million range. The luxury homes priced at R5 million to R10 million and above that bracket are still finding it difficult to attract buyers and could well stay on the market for several more months to come.”
When asked if the coming months might not produce a crop of more wealthy buyers, Lubbe said that while it is possible, it has not, in his experience, happened previously during this period. “Typical buyers today,” he said, “are shrewd, well informed about the market and know that if they take their time about their selection they can get great value. There is almost no impulse buying, as in the old days.”
