NIGERIANS SHIFT TO SOUTH AFRICA, ACQUIRE N972BN PROPERTY IN DUBAI

The super-rich Nigerians are shifting their investment focus from the United Arab Emirates to South African cities for property investment.

A report said they have invested over $6 billion in Dubai’s property market in the  last three years before shifting investment focus to South African property market.

Investigations revealed that Nigerian buyers top the list of Africans investing in property business in South Africa.  Others are India, China, Britain and other  European countries.

The weak South African Rand was said to have spurred African property buyers to snap up high-end homes on Cape Town’s luxurious Atlantic Seaboard and the City Bowl.

It has been reported that Nigeria’s rich have ploughed their money into buying second homes in London, New York, Paris and other global cities where they like to holiday, shop and do business.

A report in 2012 said Nigerians sunk $52.2 million into the Dubai property market in the first six months of the year, according to data from the Dubai Land Department.

Also, another report quoted the sales manager of The First Group, a property company based in Dubai, to have said that over $6 billion has been invested in Dubai’s property market by Nigerians over the past three years, accounting for about 60 per cent of all sales by the company.

Speaking on the takeover bid of Nigerian super-rich property merchants, Managing Director of property and real estate company Seef, Mr. Ian Slot, said the shaky currency has revived “foreign buying activity” in the country built industry.

Slot said his company had sold 75 properties for almost R566-million (N9billion) since January, which include nine sales above R20-million, (N315million), four of which were to African buyers.

According to him, the company’s total sales for the whole of last year were R570-million (N9billion).

“African buyer activity has more than doubled with 12 property sales to the value of over R142-million compared to about six property sales in 2012,” Slot said.

“Nigerian buyers top the list with four properties, including an apartment at the V&A Waterfront for R25-million and a luxury home in Bantry Bay for R30-million. An Angolan buyer also paid R30-million for a home in Camps Bay.”

The company has sold 10 properties to buyers from India and China for a total of more than R61-million.

Slot said European buyers have bought 28 properties this year, worth almost R155-million.

Of these, 18 properties worth R63-million were bought by British buyers.

“While foreign buying activity has improved over the last few months, overall volumes are still down since 2009, when 435 properties with a combined value of over R1.5-billion were sold to foreign buyers,” said Slot.

“The positive foreign buyer sentiment in the lead-up to the 2010 World Cup was stifled by the continued uncertainty in the UK and European economies. The upside of this is that many UK and European buyers have looked to shift their funds into South African properties and the weak Rand has served as a significant incentive,”he said.

Source: Daily Newswatch