Emigration spike and what it means for your property

According to a recent FNB Property Barometer report, an increasing number of South Africans are selling their homes with plans to emigrate. "Emigration-driven sales have become a more prominent feature of the housing market in South Africa over the past two years," FNB said.

Although formal figures on emigration and immigration are hard to come by, estate agent surveys and housing data have indicated that emigration accounted for about 13 percent of the home sales across the country in 2019. Emigration sales rose to 13.4% in Q2 of 2019, representing a 10 year high.

New World Immigration, which specialises in migration advice and work permit services, assists on average, two Cape Town families a day - 520 a year - with their emigration processes. Of those homeowners who leave, the split between selling or letting is 50/50, says company director Robbie Ragless. "Emigration can be a costly affair so the sale of the home normally supplements the costs of emigration. It is however tricky as one only chooses to sell their home once the visas have been approved."

Emigration is a trend that we've experienced first hand, with a notable increase in the number of our sellers putting their properties on the market with us for the purposes of selling to emigrate to countries such as The United Kingdom, The Netherlands and Australia, to name a few.

Marthinus Botha, Managing Director at Greeff Christie's International Real Estate - City Bowl, Atlantic & Western Seaboard explains that "we've noted the trend of more clients selling to emigrate, and as such, we've gone on a drive to identify and partner with various high-quality services providers that are able to complement our brokerage service and ultimately add value to our client's property transactions".

Some of these service providers in our network include emigration attorneys, international logistics, home contents sale and liquidation services as well as currency traders. 

Ryan Greeff, Director at Greeff Christie's International Real Estate - City Bowl, Atlantic & Western Seaboard comments that "our ability to offer an end-to-end solution on the property disposal side of the emigration process has been received with much enthusiasm from the market. What sets us apart from competitors is that we continuously try to innovate and find new ways to add value to our client's real estate transactions, this is a great example of how we are bringing that value to life."

Are you thinking of selling your property and/or emigrating? Click here and one of our area specialist brokers will be in touch to explain more about how we can assist.