Expats Returning to South Africa to Escape Financial Crisis

With FIFA 2010 coming up, Cape Town South Africa remains an exciting property investment and offers superior world class living for it's residents.

Big-ticket home sales, which have been missing from the market for months, have started to re-appear in the wake of improving sentiment.

Several luxury homes have been sold in SA, including some of the finest property in the Southern Suburbs and the Atlantic Seaboard.

"Last year there was only bad news – Eskom, Zimbabwe, higher interest rates and bigger deposits – and everyone froze in their tracks and put home purchasing on hold. This year there is much good news among the bad, people have adjusted to their new circumstances and things are starting to move again," he says.

Many of these multimillion-rand sales are cash deals and so do not really depend on declining interest rates but on improving sentiment. Prices have also declined substantially and this always induces the shrewd market to come out of woodwork.

Public reports confirm that emigration has dropped drastically and significant numbers of expats are returning to South Africa as they flee the fallout of the financial crisis in the UK, Europe and Australia. This is another positive for SA in terms of meeting our skills shortage and creating jobs that will ultimately boost housing demand.

Meanwhile, interest rates continue to fall and are expected to fall further in the coming months. Inflation is falling and disposable incomes improving, which is already increasing the demand for housing.

With FIFA 2010 Football World Cup just around the corner it does appear that we are now on the threshold of the bottom of the market and that a turn is in sight. Big-ticket sales are a strong indicator of returning confidence and this combined with an improving credit outlook should see prices stabilise in the second half of the year.