Two shopping centres hold promise
THE Aucor property multiple auction on October 16, at the Park Hyatt Hotel in Rosebank, will offer a portfolio of prime retail properties.
Included in the portfolio will be the Lydenburg Spar Shopping Centre, on the corner of Voortrekker and Viljoen Streets in Lydenburg, Mpumalanga.
Situated on the SterkspruitDorps River tributary of the Olifants River, Lydenburg is at the base of the Long Tom Pass.
The Spar Shopping Centre is in the central business district (CBD) and is surrounded by a high concentration of retail outlets and commercial buildings.
The area has good accessibility and limited congestion, and the main arterial routes are all within easy reach.
The property spans four portions of erf 186 and has a combined land extent of 9,425m².
This fully let property has a gross lettable area (GLA) of 4,119m² and a gross income of about R4m a year.
The anchor tenant is Spar, which has a lease until 2022. The centre forms a U-shape and has ample parking in the middle, with easy access to all shops.
In Klerksdorp, Edgars Building, a three-storey, stand-alone retail building at 70 Oliver Tambo Street (formerly Church Street) is on offer. The building is centrally located in the town’s CBD.
KFC, OK Furniture, Bradlows and Ellerines are all in the immediate surrounding area.
Together with Rustenburg, Klerksdorp forms the economic heart of North West province and is one of the hubs of the gold mining industry.
The Klerksdorp building is fully let to Edgars as the sole tenant, with the lease in place until 2016. The property has an erf extent of 1,983m² and a GLA of 4,223m².
The gross income is R2,13m a year.
The ground and first floors are used for retail purposes and the second and third floors for storage and offices. The storage area on the top floor is double volume, allowing for maximum use of this space for stacking boxes.
The building features two escalators, which provide access from the ground floor to the first floor, as well as a goods lift.
The service yard on the southern side of the building has 10 shade-net parking bays for use by the staff.
There is no on-site parking for customers, but there is parking along the three adjoining streets.
Also coming under the hammer is a regional shopping centre, with Pick n Pay as the anchor tenant, on the R40 road on the northern periphery of Hoedspruit.
The town has grown in recent years, due to its proximity to private game reserves, the Kruger National Park and the Hoedspruit Air Force Base.
The area has good accessibility and limited congestion, and main arterial routes such as the R527 and R40 are all within easy reach.
The property features a singlestorey retail shopping centre with ample parking.
The retail areas vary in size from 42m² to 2,626m². Rollershutter doors at the rear of some retail units allow good accessibility to the shops for delivery and loading purposes.
The largest area is occupied by Pick n Pay, which has its own service area at the rear of the building with access through a security-controlled gate. This area has a boundary wall.
The centre has a land extent of 24,325m² and a GLA of 8,035m².
Comprising 34 units, this centre features other major national tenants including Mr Price, First National Bank, Spur, the South African Post Office and Pep. Thirty-two units are let at present and the lease agreement with Pick n Pay is set to expire in 2017. The gross income is about R6m a year. A RECENTLY unearthed painting formerly owned by the Oppenheimer family, Portrait of a young Mpondo, by renowned South African artist Irma Stern, will be sold at the Bonhams South African sale on October 17.
Proceeds from the sale of the work, which is estimated at £200,000-£300,000, will fund a scholarship for African students at Oxford University.
The painting was part of the collection of Caroline (Ina), Lady Oppenheimer, Johannesburg. It then passed to her sister Diana, Lady Balfour of Inchrye, before being gifted to Oxford University. Sir Ernest Oppenheimer and Lady Oppenheimer were great patrons of the arts in SA and supporters of Irma Stern’s work in particular. They purchased several of her paintings for their private collection, and donated others to the South African National Gallery in Cape Town.
The Oxford department of international development has a longstanding relationship with the Oppenheimer family. Sir Ernest Oppenheimer (1880-1957), cofounder of Anglo American and chairman of De Beers, was a key benefactor of the foundation of the department of international development in its original form as Queen Elizabeth House (in celebration of the present queen’s coronation in 1953).
It is appropriate, therefore, that this picture is being sold to raise funds for a scholarship programme for African students. These students will go to Oxford to undertake one of the department’s renowned postgraduate programmes, aimed at understanding change and reducing inequality in developing countries.
“This wonderful Stern portrait of a young African warrior has hung on our walls for many years and it will be sad to let it go, but the resources from the sale will make a significant contribution to the lives of young scholars,” says Prof Valpy FitzGerald, head of the department of international development.
When Stern was not travelling to Europe, Zanzibar or the Congo, she explored her adopted country of SA, a country never short on beautiful models for her work.
Her abiding visual and anthropological interests in traditional dress — as both an expression of culture and a vivid orchestration of different colours and textures — are amply demonstrated in Portrait of a young Mpondo.