Possible SA moratorium on foreign buying and selling of land

[Carolinian]

Today's London Daily Telegraph reports that a study panel of the SA government is proposing a moratorium on foreigners either buying or selling land of any type in SA, followed possibly by a ban on foreigners being able to purchase land. The president is said to be in sympathy with this position.

While this would not appear to impact owning timeshares organized as shareblocks, as most of them are, it would probably impact deeded ownership resorts.

 

[spiceycat]

that is

I just hope they don't.

would we have to give back our timeshares to the resort?

 

[philemer]

If you do a google and read the article you will see that this proposal has to do with foreigners buying mostly arable land that the SA gov't has promised to start returning to the Black population. They can't return this land if it is owned by foreigners. Now we're treading on politics..... My guess is your t/s will be safe.

Phil

 

[Carolinian]

However, the article does mention the potentially broad sweep of this proposal, and the concerns of real estate agents that this could end the booming market in vacation homes. It is not suggested that it would ban ownership by foreigners, just a moratorium on purchase and sale until a new policy is worked out. Maybe the new policy would exempt timeshares, but who knows.

 

[Carol C]

Does that law govern "land" only, or does it also include "grass shacks"?

 

[robbiefields]

First, the proposal was limited to large swathes of land, not residential lots.

Second, the proposal has been shelved.

Third, the S.A. property market right now is driven by local demand, not foreigners. Foreigners like me came in as bottom feeders, other foreigners come in later at the market top. That top may have been already reached in Clifton and Camp's Bay in Cape Town but we have still have a long, long way to go elsewhere in the country.

There are certain classes of South Africans making huge sums of money in this booming, resource based economy. For the first time in a generation, they see better value and more security investing locally.

 

[Carolinian]

Good to hear that it has been shelved. It was a bad idea to begin with!

 

[Aldo]

One of the problems South Africa faces as an emerging nation, is that partially due to the large amounts of gold mined there and the relative smallness of the Rand on the world currency markets, the Rand has been very subject to attacks by currency manipulators and speculators, hedge funds, etc, etc.

In fact, it was just such an attack that made it possible for us to buy all these SA weeks at such low prices a few years back.

One of the biggest problems any emerging nation must grapple with is the question of foreign ownership of it's resources, means of production, and foreign exploitation of it's labor.

Obviously, an emerging nation needs foreign involvment and foreign capital
(SA needs less foreign capital than does other nations), but on the other hand, what historically happens is that foreign interests end up literally controlling all the production, the resources, and all the surplus value of the labor in emerging countries. This benefits the emerging nation not at all, and only a tiny small priviledged minority in the emerging nation actually get any benefits at all.

It's important that the average person actually keep a stake in their own country.