The Rawson Property Group’s new drive to gain a substantial share in the market for Atlantic Coast properties of the Southern Cape Peninsula including, Kommetjie’s Long Beach is beginning to pay dividends, says Kim Mann, co-franchisee with her brother, Steven Mann, for Fish Hoek and surrounding areas. There could not be a better time for undertaking such an expansion as these precincts are now more popular than ever before and are experiencing “surprisingly large” value rises. This in turn, she says, is leading to a shortage of stock.
These facts were confirmed by Barry Fourie, Mann’s agent serving the Kommetjie and Imhoff’s Gift areas. Fourie has recently done comparative market analyses on two main groups of property in this area.
The first covered the 56 true coastal beach-fronting homes between Klein Slangkop, the landmark on the 12 km long Noordhoek beach to the Slangkop/Kommetjie lighthouse, and Misty Cliffs to the south.
Fourie’s figures indicate that the latest average valuation of the coastal properties which genuinely qualify as beach or sea-fronting has now risen by 68,4% on the 2012 Municipal Valuations to R7,762,863.
Fourie’s second survey covered 86 homes owned by people of pensionable age, most of whom have lived there for 11 years or longer. In the last six months the average selling price of homes here has risen by 15,4% from R2,447,828 to R2,826,667.
In 2013 there were 180 sales in Kommetjie and thus far in 2014 there have been 36. It is still early days to say this possibly indicates a slow-down in sales, but, says Fourie, prices continue to firm.
“In the lower price brackets,” said Fourie, “in general it can be said that homes that in 2012, sold at under or around R2 million have risen to over R3 million.”
Fourie added that in these conditions the temptation among the relatively few sellers is always to overprice, in the process ignoring the counsel of valuers like himself.
This is, however, almost always a self-defeating tactic, the result of which is simply to cause frustration and a delay of the sale (at a reduced price), by anything from six to 24 months – if the property sells at all.
Two properties for which he has recently been mandated as the sales agent, said Fourie, were recently selected by Bill Rawson, the Chairman of the Rawson Property Group, for inclusion in his prestigious Chairman’s Portfolio.
The first property is a Victorian/Cape Dutch style beach cottage with a long covered voorstoep. Sited at Kommetjie, it has direct access to Long Beach. The home has two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a study, an open-plan lounge/kitchen, a double garage, a storage area and servants’ quarters.
Extensive lawns lead onto a lap pool and entertainment area. The 1,332 m2 of the site is, in fact, made up of two erven, so the buyer could develop a second home here. This is one of the reasons why the list price is above average, even for this area, at R13,5 million.
The second property selected by Rawson is at Misty Cliffs. Here for an asking price of R8,950,000, the home, said Rawson, is one of real distinction. It is one of only 12 beachfront homes on this section of the coastline and is double storey with certain Cape features such as end gables. Extensive use is made of natural varnished wood door, window and balcony fittings and wood is also used for the pool and patio fencing. The home has three double bedrooms, all with their own bathrooms, a semi-separate teenage pad, a large fully equipped gourmet kitchen and spacious living and dining rooms, both of which open onto the patio area. There is, too, a double garage. The price here is R8,95 million.
“These homes,” said Rawson, “represent the very best in Cape Peninsula seaside living and I am absolutely confident will make a wonderful investment for buyers.”
