South Africa’s residential property market is continuing to deliver growth ahead of inflation, with the latest available figures from Statistics South Africa showing that national residential property prices increased by 7,9% year-on-year in April 2026. This was almost double the 4,0% consumer inflation rate recorded for the same month and well ahead of the 4,3% inflation rate in July.
In broad terms, this means that residential property is firmly back on track to gain value real (after inflation) terms, but performance does vary considerably between metropolitan areas.
The strongest performer by some margin in the first part of the year was Cape Town, where residential property prices were 11,0% higher than a year earlier. This was followed by Nelson Mandela Bay at 6,4%, Johannesburg at 5,4%, Buffalo City at 5,0% and Ekurhuleni at 4,9%.
At the other end of the scale, price growth was considerably slower in Mangaung, at 2.8%, eThekwini at 3.7% and Tshwane at 3.8%. These markets were therefore recording nominal price growth below April’s 4.0% inflation rate.
Across all metropolitan areas combined, residential property prices rose 7,6% year-on-year. StatsSA says Cape Town was by far the biggest contributor to this increase, with its 11,0% growth contributing 4,3 percentage points to the overall metropolitan increase. Johannesburg contributed a further 1,1 percentage points, followed by Ekurhuleni and Tshwane.
The figures also reveal an interesting distinction between different types of property. Pre-owned properties increased in value by 8,5% nationally over the year, while properties being sold for the first time increased by only 1,3%. Freehold properties also substantially outperformed sectional title, rising 8.8% compared with 6,0% for sectional title.
Meanwhile, buyers may find the most interesting opportunities in the slower-growing markets. These are not necessarily weak markets, they may just currently have more stock available, and that can mean that buyers have more choice and potentially greater negotiating power, while sellers may be more realistic about pricing. For first-time buyers in particular, this can create an opportunity to enter the market before stronger price growth returns.
The StatsSA figures suggest that buyers in markets such as Mangaung, eThekwini and Tshwane may currently have a different opportunity to those shopping in Cape Town, where prices are already rising at more than twice the rate of inflation. They do not mean, of course, that buyers should simply target any market with low price growth. Local factors remain critical, including employment prospects, infrastructure, transport links, specific suburb demand, rental demand and the availability of well-priced properties.
The real key is to elicit the help of a trusted property professional to identify areas where prices have yet to catch up with underlying demand, and where a good properties can still be bought at a realistic price.
