Reporter: Why did Private Property come up with the Neighbourhoods concept?
Simon Bray: Private Property Neighbourhoods aims to answer the question ‘What is it like to live here?’ We already have all the properties on the market on the website so we can certainly help you find your next home, but we realised that people don’t only choose their perfect home they also choose their perfect neighbourhood. An area is so much more than just the houses on the market, it’s the people that live there, the restaurants and shops, the schools and businesses, that make up a neighbourhood. As SA’s favourite property website we felt that Private Property was perfectly placed to tell these neighbourhood stories and give people a whole new way to interact with SA’s property markets.
What stats are available for each neighbourhood on Private Property?
A key part of Private Property Neighbourhoods is the property data and insight we give about the area. All the listings are already on the website so we have a great aggregate view of the market, it was just about making this data visible and useful. You can expect to see median house prices in the neighbourhood for the different house types, the price trend over the last few years to see if the market is growing or not and some really great rental price data too.
How can it be used as an investment tool?
This is the first time in South Africa that real time sales data is presented right next to rental data in an area. This allows investors to see the capital growth in an area and compare that to the rental growth. Any savvy investor will see this as a great tool to compare rental yields across different neighbourhoods and identify the best performing property types in those neighbourhoods.
What insights will it offer on the various neighbourhoods?
Property and price data is only one of the insights on offer. There is an interactive map that shows the boundaries of the neighbourhood and the key suburbs within it, there is great local content about the best features in the area and a full gallery that showcases the highlights of living in that particular neighbourhood. Most exciting perhaps is the lifestyle classification of the neighbourhoods, this allows areas to be tagged with key lifestyle tags for example; 'Leafy and Quiet' or 'Urban Sophistication’. Once tagged people will be able to search for locations based on these tags so if you like living in an urban neighbourhood, you’ll now be able see all other urban neighbourhoods across the country.
What makes this so special or unique?
This combination of key property information about a neighbourhood is completely original and unique in the South African market. To make it really special and to give people the richest experience possible Private Property has embarked on a nationwide mission to film the top neighbourhoods in the country. These video showcases include following locals around their neighbourhood, awesome aerial cinematography and great shots of key landmarks and community hotspots. This type of project is on a scale never seen before and we really hope it’ll empower consumers across the country to make the best property decisions.
