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Johannesburg - The Greater Johannesburg area is undoubtedly the metropolis with the most stable property market in South Africa.
Although house prices in this locality no longer show spectacular growth, there is no question of a sharp decline - unlike in other large cities.
The star performer in this metropolis is certainly the East Rand, which nowadays falls within the Ekurhuleni local authority.
No-one knows how long the situation will persist because, according to Absa's latest housing survey, in the past quarter there were the first signs that the market in the Johannesburg environment had also reached a turning point.
In the Greater Johannesburg area second-quarter prices were 1.1% higher than a year ago, and growth of 0.5% was recorded between the first and the second quarter.
On the East Rand prices were 1.8% higher than a year ago, and in the past quarter average prices rose a healthy R25 000 or 1.3%.
In the central and southern regions, as well as in the north-west, there was for the first time a slight decline in the second quarter, indicating that conditions could worsen.
In the north-west in particular, which includes the more upmarket residential areas of Sandton, Randburg and the West Rand, prices dropped 1.6% in the past quarter, after having previously held steady.
The Pretoria market was one of the first to turn. Here prices have trended downwards every quarter since 2007, when the average peaked at R1 073 754.
The current R1 025 337 average is 2.9% lower than in the previous quarter, 4.1% lower than a year ago and 4.4% down on the 2007 peak.
The exceptional prices fetched by properties along Cape Town's Atlantic seaboard is usually great news, but the broad middle market in Cape Town has for the past five years considerably underperformed that in Greater Johannesburg.
In the market for houses costing less than R3.1m, the average Johannesburg price for the past five years has lifted by some 40%. Prices in this section of the Cape Town market have risen only 26%. In the mother city prices reached a high in the second quarter of 2008 - and in the past twelve months have contracted by 3.1%.
The turning point in Durban was in 2007, and the average price is now 11% down. The city faring worst is Port Elizabeth, where prices shed a massive 18.3% in the past year and the market is back at levels last seen in 2006.
- Sake24.com
For more business news in Afrikaans, go to Sake24.com.