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Cape Town - Paarl, Franschhoek and Stellenbosch in the Western Cape are the areas with the fastest growing numbers of millionaires (individuals with net assets of $1m - about R14.5m - or more) in South Africa, according to a report by New World Wealth.
The number of millionaires in these three towns and their surroundings has increased by 38% from 2007 to 2015. The Garden Route also performed well.
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At the same time, it turns out Johannesburg and Cape Town did not do as well in terms of the percentage of growth in the number of millionaires over that period. In Johannesburg a large number millionaires moved abroad or to other parts of the country.
In Cape Town it seems millionaires tend to hold a large proportion of their assets in residential property. They were, therefore millionaires "hard hit" by the fall in local property prices in dollar terms, according to the report.
Pretoria performed relatively well, mainly due to certain residential estates in the area, which attracted a number of millionaires to move there.
Johannesburg is still home to the largest portion of South Africa’s millionaires (44%), according to the report. There are also still sizable populations of these so-called high net worth individuals (HNWIs) living in Cape Town (18%), Pretoria (7%) and Durban (7%).
As the business and financial hub of South Africa, Johannesburg includes Sandton, where major industries for millionaires include financial services, basic materials and construction.
Major industries for millionaires in Cape Town, on the other hand, include real estate, financial services (especially fund management), retail and tourism. In Pretoria major industries for millionaires include basic materials, manufacturing and financial services.
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Durban and surrounding areas like Umhlanga form the commercial hub of KwaZulu Natal. Major industries for millionaires in this region include pharmaceuticals (healthcare), construction and transport. Our Durban figures include surrounding areas such as Umhlanga.
Overall, real estate and construction is the main industry from which SA millionaires have acquired their wealth. It is the primary source of wealth for 20% of local millionaires.
Other important industries for them include financial services (19%), basic materials (11%), diversified (11%), retail (8%), tech & telecoms (7%), FMCG (6%), healthcare (6%), transport & logistics (3%), manufacturing (3%), media (3%) and hotels & leisure (2%).
The fastest growing sectors for South African millionaires over the 2007 to 2015 period were telecoms, media, insurance (part of financial services) and healthcare.
