Black women changing private property investment in South Africa

More investors, a rapidly diversifying base and smaller portfolios per person

South Africa’s private property investor base has expanded over the past decade, becoming more diverse and shifting towards smaller investment portfolios. The number of private property investors increased by around 22%, from fewer than 120 000 in 2015 to more than 140 000 at the end of 2025. This represents more than double the broader property market growth of 10.6% over the same period.

Lightstone’s analysis also revealed that the investor pool is becoming more diverse as the proportion of men and White investors shrinks and increasing numbers of Black women, in particular, enter the market.

The analysis also found that investors have remained in the category for longer, and growth was concentrated among modest entry-level portfolios while larger holdings have become rarer.

Investors have kept their own homes (each investor's single highest-value property; everything else they hold is treated as an investment property) and their investment properties quite distinct in character, favouring conventional freehold living for themselves while leaning towards higher-density, lower-maintenance investment stock. They have also tended to invest close to where they live, rather than pursuing opportunities elsewhere.

The fundamentals: how many properties, and shared with whom?

Nearly 90% of private investors own between three and five properties – 61% have three properties, 20% own four, and 8% own five. A small tail of 1% holds more than 10 properties.

Six in ten private property investors own just three properties

There has been strong growth just below the three-property line: 290 315 people owned two properties in 2015, and this increased to 373 435 in 2025.

Shared ownership, meanwhile, is common but rarely complicated: 57% of the properties analysed in 2025 were owned by one person only, 41% by two people – typically spouses or partners – and just 2% by three or more people (see graph further below).

This is important when interpreting every ‘average portfolio size’ figure elsewhere in this article: once a jointly owned property is split fairly between its owners – crediting each co-owner only their share, rather than counting a shared property as fully owned by each of them – the average comes out at under three, even though every investor here owns or co-owns three or more properties on a straight count.

Number of persons per title deed in 2025

A rapidly diversifying investor base

White men remain the largest group of private property investors, followed by White women. Black male investors number around half as many as White male investors, while Black women remain slightly behind Black men in absolute numbers.

Black women, however, recorded the fastest growth among these four investor groups between 2015 and 2025.

Growth/decline of South African property investors by gender and race: 2015 – 2025

Where do visitors come from?

Investors in and out

Only around half (49%) of the people classified as private property investors in 2015 still met the definition in 2025. The remainder had sold enough properties to fall below the three-property threshold.

The same shift is reflected not only in who entered the market, but also in who exited. White investors accounted for nearly 70% of those who exited, exceeding their 61% share of the investor pool in 2015. By comparison, Black investors accounted for 9% of those who exited, below their 13% share of the investor pool in 2015.

This turnover also explains the pool's ageing. Investors under 40 fell from 15% of the pool in 2015 to 10% in 2025, while investors 70 and over nearly doubled their share (6% to 10%). The age mix of those who became private investors for the first time since 2015 looks almost identical to the investor pool of 2015 (16% under 40, versus 15% in the 2015 pool as a whole).

The ageing shows up almost entirely among the investors who have held their status continuously since 2015: naturally, ten years on, their under-40 share has collapsed from 15% to 1%, while their 70+ share has more than quadrupled (from 4% to 18%). The investor pool is ageing because a large share of today's investors are the same people who were already investors a decade ago.

More investors, smaller portfolios

Growth was concentrated at the entry level, with the number of investors owning three properties increasing by 24% over the decade. The number of investors owning four to five properties increased by 16%, while those owning six to 10 properties increased by 10%. In contrast, the number of investors owning 11 to 20 properties declined by 2%, while those with portfolios of 21 or more properties decreased by 20%.

Growth at the bottom, decline at the top: investors by portfolio size

The shift towards smaller investment portfolios is also reflected in their value. Looking only at investment properties, excluding each investor's own home, the average investment portfolio fell from roughly R3.0m in 2015 to R2.8m in 2025. So, while more people are investing in property, the typical individual stake, in both property count and value, is smaller than it used to be.

What kind of property, and how far from home?

Investors' own homes are overwhelmingly freehold (82%), but 42% of their investment properties are sectional title. This isn't a new trend, either, as the sectional title share of investment properties is unchanged from 2015.

Most investing also happens close to home: 64% of investment properties sit in the same municipality as the investor's own home, rising to roughly four in five in the same province.

Cape Town illustrates the point: of private investors whose own home is in the City of Cape Town, 70% of their investment properties are also in Cape Town itself, and almost all the rest are within the Western Cape's own lifestyle and second-home belt (Hermanus, the West Coast, the Winelands) rather than being spread around the country.