6 new developments in Cape Town top R950 million – including this luxury hotel

·17 Sep 2019

New property developments exceeding R950 million were reported in the Cape Town CBD this year, despite the difficult economic environment.

This is one of the key findings from the State of Cape Town Central City Report, which was published on Tuesday (16 September).

The report shows that the value of property in the central city soared by nearly 40%, from R30.628 billion in 2016/2017, to R42.860 billion in 2018/2019, with a total of 39 new developments worth in excess of R13.5 billion either recently completed, under construction or in the pipeline.

Now a further six new developments worth in excess of R968 million have been reported in 2019 thus far, said SCCR researcher and economic research analyst, Sandra Gordon.

Three of the six new developments are hotels which have already opened – two five-star luxury hotels namely Gorgeous George and Labotessa – and one three-star hotel, the Signature Lux hotel on the Foreshore.

These three hotels add a further 196 new rooms to the city’s hotel pool, Gordon said.

Two additional developments are residential – The Duke and Fleetway House – while Foreshore Place will be a mixed-use development with both commercial and residential space. These three developments are scheduled to add an additional 416 residential units to the central city.

“Adding these new developments (and including an estimated R130 million for City Park which was not included in the SCCR 2018 estimate) to the estimate of recently completed, under construction, planned and proposed developments increases the total to R14.67 billion,” the report said.

Other key findings in the report include:

While vacancy rates for commercial office space rose in the last year, with 30 000m2 of new office space coming on to the market over an 18 month period (14 000m² in 2018), Cape Town continues to have the lowest office vacancy rates of South Africa’s five largest metropolitan centres;

The retail sector serving workers and residents in the downtown area has remained stable, despite lagging economic conditions, with a steady 93% retail occupancy rate, and an increase of more than a third in the number of restaurants in the CBD, from 114 in 2017 to 153;

Cape Town has affirmed its status as the leading digital city in Africa, recognised as a hub for technology development and innovation, and providing over 40 000 jobs in the sector, significantly higher than other tech hubs such as Johannesburg (20,000), Lagos (9,000) and Nairobi (7,000).

Gorgeous George