Camps Bay achieves record sales in spite of market dip

The Glen side of Camps Bay has always been the most sought after part of this exclusive Atlantic seaboard suburb, consistently achieving the highest sale prices because of its proximity to Clifton and the Camps Bay strip as well as its enviable wind-free position.

This is corroborated by a recent Lightstone report which revealed that Glen Road is the second most valuable street in South Africa. However, the Twelve Apostles side of Camps Bay which overlooks Bakoven has become increasingly popular and prices are now nudging the suburb’s record transactions.

Brendan Miller, Lew Geffen Sotheby’s International Realty Atlantic Seaboard chief executive, recently sold a 854.4m² state-of-the-art home for R47 million including VAT at R55 009/m², which is superseded by only two other sales in the area – one on Glen Beach and another in Bakoven. A third property, the Enigma estate, was sold privately earlier this year for an undisclosed amount after being on the market for R99m.

Miller says: “Camps Bay remains popular despite the overall slowing in the economy and housing market as it offers investors a wide choice in properties with its 60/40 mix of freehold and sectional title homes.

“The suburb also has an advantage over its immediate neighbours in that most of the houses are on sizeable stands. It is notable that much of the recent activity in the market has been driven by younger investors under the age of 35. This is in line with the marked increase in first time buyer activity in South Africa in recent years, particularly within commuting distance of cities, as the young professional demographic has expanded.”

Lew Geffen, chairman of Lew Geffen Sotheby’s International Realty Property says: “Investment in Camps Bay has always been lucrative, which is borne out by the fact that properties across all price bands have recorded on average a healthy nominal percentage return on investment of 16 percent a year over eight years.

“And five years ago only around 10 percent of all freehold house sales were priced above R10m, whereas almost 40 percent of recent sales fall into this price band.

“In the eight years between 2007 and the end of 2014, the R10m to R20m price band improved by a whopping 138 percent from with a total of 16 properties sold to the value of R211m compared to only seven homes worth a total R88.98m in 2007.”

Miller says that Camps Bay also has a dynamic rental market with long-term and short-term lets commanding some of the highest rates in the country.

“Long-term house rentals now range on average between R30 000 and R70 000 a month, and owners can command over R30 000 a day for a luxury villa.”

However, while Cape Town’s luxury housing market has been on the up for over a decade, luxury properties in the Mother City are still cheap by international standards, according to a recent report by Wealth-x and Sotheby’s International Realty, Europe, Middle-East and Africa Luxury Residential Real Estate 2015.

The weak rand continues to attract foreign investors to areas like the Atlantic seaboard as comparative luxury properties in sought-after areas are at least twice as expensive, with some even up to nine times more expensive.

The report’s authors calculated their luxury real estate rankings by comparing the price a square foot of properties valued at more than $1 million (R12m) and Cape Town was found to have the lowest average price a square foot, and the lowest average listing price for such properties, making it an extremely affordable and attractive investment prospect for foreign investors.