Page 14 - Dainfern Precinct Living 3 2021

PROPERTY
HOUSE PRICE SCENARIOS
DEFY COVID-19 ADVERSITY
Lightstone, a
leading provider of
comprehensive data,
analytics and systems
in the property
industry, suggests
scenarios that could
see house prices rise
by between 2.1% and
5.2% in 2021.
esidential property
prices defied COVID-19
conventional wisdom in
R2020, and house price
inflation ended close to 3% at the
end of the year, some 2.7% above
Lightstone’s forecast made at the
beginning of 2020 and 6% above the As news of the economic impact
highest post COVID-19 prediction.
Lightstone anticipates residential
sales will continue to hold their
own, and house price inflation is
anticipated to be anything between
2.1% and 4%, with a potential
upside in the luxury sector.
Before COVID-19 struck, Lightstone
forecasted that annual house growth
was going to drop from 1.4% at the
end of 2019 to about 0.3% at the
end of 2020. “We took this view
because of low economic growth
12
DPL
forecasts of about 1% for 2020 and
the generally weak housing market
conditions that were expected to
continue from 2019 into 2020,”
says Paul-Roux de Kock, Analytics
Director for Lightstone.
of the coronavirus outbreak filtered
through international media towards
the end of 2019, its true impact was
only really felt in Europe in the first
quarter of 2020, and in South Africa
in the second quarter.
Apprehension turned to panic in
many quarters as COVID-19 worked
its way into South Africa and the
impact of the economic lockdown
was assessed. Economic forecasts
were hurriedly adjusted downwards
and even the most optimistic