Race on for retirement complexes
Two planned for East London area target asset-rich pensioners
The race is on to build two village-style retirement complexes in the East London area, with Mission Holding Group’s (MHG) Kidds Beach complex, which launched on Friday, edging slightly ahead of The Cycad Retirement Village (Cycad).
The latter is a United Property Management (UPM) project, which lies in the valley between Beacon Bay and Gonubie, bordering the N2.
There is an ongoing debate about whether the west coast is a better buying option than the east. West is closer to the airport and the industrial centre. East is the gateway to the Wild Coast.
However, with the development of Bhisho as a centre of government, property sales in the west have boomed, with the east not matching it.
Kidds Beach is fast becoming East London’s most in-demand new super-suburb, mainly due to MHG’s building and sales spree. It has sold over 500 homes, and has the land for its target of 5,000 homes by 2029.
It has also ploughed money into a mall, a new church and a private school.
UPM director Tony Ward said work had started at Cycad “but mainly on the aesthetics of the complex”.
“As our name implies, we are starting on cycad gardens, and will have several green open spaces. We have reserved most of the site for natural bush and riverine forest.”
Cycad’s development plan is a mixed-use complex, which includes 200 homes, from flats to two-bedroom houses, on a 15ha site.
MHG marketing managerNatelie Kriel said: “Local retirement centres currently have waiting lists of up to 15 years, so the news of a retirement option within close proximity to town comes as a great relief to many.
“We continuously look to market trends and demands to ensure that the development caters to the individual needs of the community, and a comfortable retirement is right up there.”
The seniors retired, or soon to be retiring, community is an attractive market for developers, mainly because many in the target market are asset-rich.
They own their own bondfree homes, which can be sold and effectively exchanged for a retirement home, and the balance invested in a good pension-supplementing income.
Kriel said seniors expect three things from a retirement village: “The security of the village must be faultless, the prices affordable – within the range of what they earned from the sale of their home – and it must offer emergency health care and hospitable access.”
Kriel said plans for a 100-bed hospital already have Buffalo City Metro approval and construction will start in a few months.
Impangele Gardens, the sector of green estate with a seniors’ community, is within the secure, gated estate with access control and 24-hour security.
The retirement homes have three bedrooms with en suite bathrooms.
The security of the village must be faultless