Driving economic growth by transforming the property sector
The real estate industry can be a gateway to economic upliftment for South Africans across our country if professional standards are upheld, better policy is formulated and our robust legislation is upheld.
Thato Ramaili
PPRA CEO
We have made strides over our thirty years of democracy as millions more South Africans have become proud homeowners. Historically most of our people had no market access to housing. They could only dream about owning homes let alone benefit from the financial gains of investing in residential real estate.
The entrepreneurial opportunities of becoming property practitioners and developers and forming your own business were also foreign concepts. But then an assortment of players in numerous industries pulled together to create an environment wherein people can truly thrive. From here we are ready to map the path to a bright future in home ownership.
Bringing previously disadvantaged people into our residential market has created some thriving enterprises and has done wonders for job and wealth creation. This has supported thousands of families. But a lot more work needs to be done to give opportunities to people who make up large portions of our country’s population and yet have never been exposed to a fascinating and fulfilling industry.
South Africa is a country with the right factors in it to attain success. We are alive with potential and have millions of people who are desperate to work in industries where they can build careers and improve the lives of others. What is needed is for institutions to play their part in this national calling.
“This industry changed my financial status, and it can change other people’s lives in meaningful ways.”
Industry peers and numerous people who want to know more about practising in our industry, have asked me a question over and over. How did I find myself here?
I’m an accountant by profession, but the property bug bit me and it hasn’t let go. I left Bloemfontein where I was head girl at my school and became a Fulbright scholar. I’m lucky enough to have worked for a corporate company in the US for 15 years, where I learned how to run the administration of a formal business. While I was at Sotheby’s International Realty, a global group where people broker deals for luxury homes, I found there are many different levels to property.
In my first year at the group, I was Rookie of the Year, at a time when I was the only black person among their 200-plus practitioners. I realised then that I needed to help open up this industry to people who looked like me. I wanted to show that people who think differently and who don’t necessarily want to work in conventional corporate jobs can excel as property practitioners.
I believe strongly in the value of education. As more people learn that you can have a professional career as an estate agent, which can be highly lucrative as opposed to it being a part time job, more talented and hardworking thinkers will pursue such a role.
We want the Property Practitioners Regulatory Authority (PPRA) to establish the kind of thinking that I experienced in the US. While studying there, I saw that if you’re a realtor, you’re a big deal. It’s like being a surgeon or an advocate. People mustn’t run when they hear “estate agent”.
Alive with possibility
Organisations like the PPRA, which I lead, need to play a critical role in this by enforcing robust legislation, acting when practitioners step out of line, and supporting small and growing business. The best financial institutions will back passionate people who want to develop quality homes and help to alleviate our severe national accommodation shortages.
The PPRA is a critically important real estate regulator in SA, which it needs to be to be professionalised, so that people can rely on our services and so that SA’s property practitioners are best in class. If we can set this example as an institution, others may follow suit.
A PPRA that promotes the profession of a property practitioner will attract a greater diversity of people, including women and property practitioners of colour. In turn, more people will engage these practitioners and buy properties, entering the property space.
"As Chief Executive, my mission is to make the PPRA a trusted statutory body that operates with integrity and achieves excellence. This is the excellence we need so that people feel safe when they engage in property transactions".
For property practitioners, businesses, governmental organisations and other groups to not only take the PPRA seriously but to trust us and value our work, I must educate people about how our mandate has changed and expanded under new dispensation. We’ve evolved from the previous Estate Agency Affairs Board (EAAB) and our ambit is larger now.
Encouraging black women to start property businesses
When Thato Ramaili, CEO of the Property Practitioners Regulatory Authority (PPRA), first entered real estate, the sector didn’t easily accommodate people who looked like her. Now, as a leader of a key organisation in South Africa’s (SA’s) property industry three decades into democracy, she’s passionate about driving initiatives that attract and champion black women as well as ownership diversity in real estate.
Thato spoke to Absa’s online magazine, The Address, about where SA’s property industry and residential real estate sector are today, and why future success is at estate agents’ fingertips.
State of the industry
I want to stress that the PPRA is just one of many institutions that are looking to grow the country’s residential property sector. Transformation does not require replacing white faces with black faces. To transform, we must acknowledge that there are clearly not enough black practitioners in our industry. If this can change, the industry will grow and numerous goals will be achieved, helping people to support the livelihoods of their families.
A strong private sector that includes talented practitioners and business owners, can attract millions of rands and help to deal with SA’s overarching need to house all its people.
There are currently around 46 000 property practitioners in SA, of which 14 000 are non-white. Predominantly, our property practitioners are white females, but this must shift with all kinds of demographics being represented and competing among one another. We’re in the business of selling everything from cottages to mansions and there’s no reason why new property practitioners cannot excel in social housing, for example. There’s a thriving market right there.
The PPRA supports the internship programmes run by agencies and other businesses as well as small, medium and micro enterprise (SMME) incubation programmes. There are, for example, around 26 people in the PPRA’s incubation programme right now.
The future is now
Technology is here and it must be harnessed. I’ve seen young property practitioners selling homes via social media applications like TikTok. An intern at Rawson Properties made R6 million in deals in eight months!
Innovation is a non-negotiable for success. At a time when our economy is under stress, interest rates are high and we’re only slowly reaching political certainty as we bravely embrace our government of national unity, I implore young people to become property practitioners and to buy homes. You must ride the wave!
To get there we must professionalise practitioners and better position people. We must treat rookie property practitioners better and encourage them to move on to becoming the owners of their own businesses. If we create environments in which entrepreneurship is encouraged, we can create a nation of people who create wealth and promote a deserved happy future for SA.
I implore young people to enter our sector with a steady mind. Keep up with trends, be accessible, act within the law, and work in a professional and sober manner. The world really is your oyster. Most of all, being a property practitioner should be fun and fulfilling!
Thato Ramaili
PPRA CEO