Cape Town Property Prices Continue to Rise Faster Than Other Cities’
Staff Writer
– February 16, 2026
3 min read
Residential property prices in Cape Town are rising at more than twice the pace of most other major South African cities, according to the latest data from Statistics South Africa (Stats SA).
Stats SA’s Residential Property Price Index (RPPI), which tracks changes in the prices of homes over time, shows that Cape Town recorded the strongest growth in the year to September 2025. An index works by setting a base period and then measuring percentage changes from that point, allowing for clean comparisons across cities and over time.
Between September 2024 and September 2025, Cape Town’s index rose by 9.1%, meaning average residential property prices increased by that amount over the year. By comparison, the combined metro index rose by 5.9%.
Among the other metros, price growth was markedly slower. Over the same period, the index increased by 4.1% in Ekurhuleni, 3.8% in Tshwane and Buffalo City, 3.6% in eThekwini, 3.5% in Johannesburg, 2.8% in Nelson Mandela Bay, and just 0.8% in Mangaung.
The longer-term trend tells a similar story. If December 2020 is used as the RPPI’s base, Cape Town’s index is now 29.7% higher as of September 2025. Across the metros as a whole, the increase over that period was 18.5%.
Outside Cape Town, cumulative growth since December 2020 has been 22.0% in Mangaung, 18.5% in Nelson Mandela Bay, 16.1% in Tshwane, 14.5% in Ekurhuleni, 11.0% in eThekwini, 7.1% in Buffalo City, and 6.0% in Johannesburg.
While property inflation is shaped by many factors, governance quality and ongoing semigration into Cape Town appear to be supporting stronger demand. Whether other metros narrow the gap may depend in part on election outcomes after the upcoming local elections, due within the next twelve months.
