A good year for Constantia Valley property, more of the same expected

THE ECONOMIC climate notwithstanding, last year was a good year for the Constantia Valley property market, which includes Constantia, Bergvliet, Tokai, Plumstead, Diep River, Kirstenhof and Meadowridge.

And more of the same is expected for this year, according to James Lewis, Seeff licensee for the southern suburbs, Hout Bay and Llandudno, who says he expects strong demand from buyers this year, especially for homes priced below R15 million.

“The two key drivers of demand for homes in the area remain the location and lifestyle,” says Lewis.

“Property here is an excellent investment. There has been no compromise in terms of growth with prices now considerably higher than they were five years ago. In 2013 for example, the average sales price for the area was R3m according to Propstats data. By 2014, this had increased by 23 percent to R3.7m and last year, it increased further by 15 percent to R4.26m. This was against an average CPI rate of 6.1 percent and 4.6 percent for 2014 and last year.

“The Constantia Valley still offers excellent diversity in property. Most of the properties are freehold and, there is something for every budget. Although homes can now cost well into the upper millions, there is still a good selection of houses in the R4m to R8m range and even below that in Plumstead, for example.

“For luxury home buyers, there are spacious homes, often with four bedrooms or more on large plots with extras such as swimming pools and tennis courts. Some are on plots of up to 8 000m such as in Zwaanswyk and Constantia. Many of these have spectacular views as far as the False Bay coastline.”

Lewis says that in 2015, 579 properties worth almost R2.47bn were sold across the area at an average price of R4.26m. That amounts to almost two property transactions here every working day.

Although prices tend to vary considerably depending on the area, sellers achieved on average within about 8 percent of their listing prices.

The days on the market also averaged from about a week at the lower end of the price scale to about 48 days, although some properties were on the market for much longer than this. Provided sellers remain realistic, we expect much the same for the remainder of this year, says Lewis.

Freehold property changed hands at an average price of R4.9m and sectional title property sales averaged about R1.4m a transaction.

Sectional title homes were sold for within 3.8 percent of listing prices, on average, and only spent about 23 days on the market. The suburb of Constantia picked up the bulk of the activity with just over 190 property transactions worth close to R1.5bn. Almost 80 percent of all homes sold were priced below R10m.

There were about 80 sales in Constantia with about 40 percent above R10m. Top sales in the suburb as a whole ranged to about R24m in Oak Avenue and R33m in Klein Constantia Road, which was sold by Seeff.

There were two sales in sought- after Southern Cross Drive priced at R19.5m and R51.5m for an 8 000m estate with a luxury home, guest cottages, a tennis court and a small vineyard.

According to the Constantia team of Marie Durr, Janine Stevenson, Liza Snijman and Priscilla Young, the suburb will continue to draw luxury buyers for its lifestyle and mix of beautiful homes, generally offering expansive accommodation and added extras such as swimming pool, tennis court and large gardens.

The Tokai area with the Tokai Forest as its most defining feature, has a number of exclusive estates, and the soughtafter Zwaanswyk area is popular for its equestrian properties and plots of up to 8 000m .

Just over 80 properties were sold last for a total of just over R364m and an average price of R4.4m. This was about 16 percent up on the 2014 average price of R3.8m. According to agent, Heather Willis, the suburb offers a sought-after rural lifestyle, yet has excellent facilities such as good schools and the Blue Route Mall.

In the security estates, sales at Silvertree ranged from around R5m to R8m. In Stonehurst, a number of sales were recorded ranging to R9m and R10.2m. Nieuwe Steenberg and Steenberg also achieved sales ranging to R6.5m and R11.45m.

Sales in the Zwaanswyk included a few transactions above R10m ranging to R21.5m for a five-bedroom home on just over 4 000m of land.

Bergvliet is yet another of the popular suburbs with predominantly freehold homes that have been sold for around R3.2m on average.

Plumstead is still a very good value-for-money suburb according to agents Peter Marais and Peter Thornton. The market was quite active last year with about 146 sales, mostly freehold houses that were sold for under R2m.

There are also still plenty of sectional title properties in the suburb that are priced under R1.2m.