Women lead the Way: How South African Women are outpacing men in property purchases

South Africa's property market is witnessing a significant shift towards women-only buyers, according to data from Lightstone. This trend has been increasing over the past decade, with women-only buyers outpacing men-only buyers since 2016. This shift is driven by women's financial independence, market dynamics, and investment opportunities.

However, the data also shows that women are often purchasing properties at lower prices than mixed-gender couples, suggesting room for growth in women's access to higher-value properties. This highlights the need for understanding the unique needs and aspirations of women buyers and tailoring strategies accordingly.

Women dominate SA property ownership

Women are active buyers and sellers in South Africa’s property market, and outnumber men as property owners.

Hayley Ivins-Downes, Managing Executive Real Estate at Lightstone, a provider of comprehensive data, analytics and systems on property, automotive and business assets, said women-only buyers accounted for 2 154 000 (38%) of stock owned, and co-owned another 1 883 000 (33%) properties. Men-only owners accounted for 1 694 000 (29%) of all properties.

Ten years ago, Ivins-Downes said mixed gender couples buying property outnumbered both men-only and women-only buyers, but this has changed. “In 2016, women-only buyers surpassed men-only buyers and the gap between the two categories has increased steadily since then (see graph below) as the men-only proportion has remained relatively unchanged”, she said.

Women-only buyers moved ahead of mixed gender couples in 2022 to dominate property ownership.

However, while more women were buying property, the graphs below show that they were doing so at lower values (including social housing) than the other two categories. “The gap between prices paid by women-only buyers and mixed gender couples has widened since 2020”, said Ivins-Downes.

In fact, Ivins-Downes noted that women-only buyers dominated the <R750k price band, but trailed mixed gender couples in the R750m-R1.5m price band and came in third in the >R1.5m price band.

Finally, Ivins-Downes said the graph below demonstrated that women, as with men, are buying property later in life than before.