Shopping centres sales (per square meter) continued to grow in March this year according to an industry barometer, the Clur Report of South African Retail Property which tracks performance of more than two million square meters of retail space throughout South Africa and Namibia.
“The favourable upward trend seen since September in annualized trading densities has continued and has now broken through zero on a nominal basis” says Belinda Clur, whose company reports benchmarks and other key trading indicators to listed and unlisted property funds.
The key consolidated Clur benchmark (for subscribing South African shopping centres) showed annualized trading density for March at R33 820.00 per square meter, representing year on year growth of 1.8%. The respective February figures were R33 035.00 per square meter and 0.4%. This represents a consistent improvement on the -1.7% level reported back in September 2017.
Clur’s benchmark for March (for the annualized trading density at super regional and regional centres) showed year on year growth of 1.2% to R35 332.00 per square meter, that compared with the February benchmarks of R35 057.00 per square meter and -0.5%.
Small regional, community and neighbourhood centres, the Clur benchmark for annualized trading density in March was R28 737.00 per square meter. This means that year on year growth of 3% was better than the 2.3% and R28 558.00 per square meter reported for February.
Overall turnover across the monitored properties grew 7.1% in March 2018 against March 2017 and they were up 3.3% over the twelve month rolling period to March 2018.
