Housing in Southern Africa October/November 2016

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October/November 2016
ED’S NOTES
AVERAGE CIRCULATION
(SECOND QUARTER 2016)
3 727
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Tandym Print
H OUSI NG
in Southern Africa
DESIGN
Colin Mazibuko
CIRCULATION
Karen Smith
PUBLISHER
Karen Grant
DEPUTY PUBLISHER
Wilhelm du Plessis
Govan Mbeki Awards 2014 - Best Media - Housing in Southern Africa
Carol Dalglish • Editor
Developers and analysts
The IHS annual event held at the
Johannesburg Country Club
is one of those highlights on
the housing calendar. Each year Rob
Wesselo, Soula Proxenos and their
team have excelled in rolling out a
robust informative and entertaining
day.
Typically the banking sector re-
ceives a roasting from developers on
risk costs, decline rates on mortgage
applications, and funding challenges.
Anton Crouse from Cosmopolitan
Projects led the roasting.
Keynote speaker and political
commentator, Justice Malala offered
insights on what we can expect from
all the shenanigans at Luthuli House.
The politically savvy Malala an-
ticipates that President Jacob Zuma
will not be usurped and the mighty
Nkandla resident will only leave office
after the general election in 2019. The
factions in the ruling party are split
between Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma
and Cyril Ramaphosa camps. Malala
proceeded to track the President’s
bloops and blunders since firing
former Minister of Finance, Nhlanhla
Nene, itwas entertaining and compel-
ling in a Greek tragedy fashion – as
Zuma’s actions wiped out billions of
rands in the economy.
Malala’s presentation showed
President Zuma sitting on his cell
phone chatting, while the head of the
free world, United States President,
Barack Obama, stood waiting at the
table to speak. Zuma showed little
or no respect. While the next slide
showed Zuma bowing respectfully
from the waist to Chinese President,
Xi Jinping.
While these insights speak
volumes, it is the fact that the people
are not being heard by the ruling
party – that caused three million
ANC voters to stay away from the
polls. Adding to this are the students
who are not prepared to give up their
quest for free education. Unfortu-
nately all of these things threaten
investment – for services, housing
and utilities.
South African comedian Alfred
Adriaan’s witty repartee and family
jokes brought tears of laugher and
livened up the audience in between
guest speakers and panel discus-
sions.
Nedbank economi s t , Ni cky
Weimar showed how the global and
local economy impacts on what is
currently happening in the housing
sector and where we are going from
here. Despite all the bad news and the
potential downgrade to ‘junk status’
by ratings agency there is light at the
end of the tunnel.
There are a lot of great companies
in the housing sector, who persevere
and roll out housing with tight profit
margins, deliver affordable products,
and use their business acumen to
maximise and leverage deals that
benefit end users.
One fascinating presentation
about fibre optics showed that ‘fibre
optics is like the oil of the 21st century
and a 10% increase in high speed
internet connections increases GDP
by 1,3% without it the economy will
remain in the doldrums’.
Another huge housing event took
place in Port Elizabeth as the Depart-
ment of Human Settlements and the
National Home Builders Registration
Council (NHBRC) Centre for Research
and Housing Innovation rolled out an
exciting programme.
The teamat Nedbank Corporate and Investment Banking’s Affordable
Housing Development Finance division recently partnered once again
with International Housing Solutions to invite industry stakeholders,
media and developers to the 8th annual I H S conference.