A quick summation of the second quarter of 2020 – “varying degrees of lockdown!” For the month of April it was a hard lockdown, no one moving in and no one moving out. The month of May saw two relaxations for relocation, tenants, landlords and agents jumped at the chance to get people moving again. The TPN Vacancy Survey is polled in the 3rd week of the middle month each quarter; for Q2 2020 that was 21 – 27 May. This is important to note because South Africa was out of hard lockdown and the relocation rules were sufficiently relaxed to allow tenants to move, although property viewings were still not in place, the market was opening up. Many landlords experienced forced vacancies as property viewings were prohibited and movement restricted, vacancies shot back up over nine percent to 9.13% from 7.47% the previous quarter.
