RESILIENT Property Income Fund says the 10% growth in its distribution in the half year to June is the result of growth in rental incomes from retailers in small metropolitan areas.

Resilient benefited from its bias of owning retail property in small cities and large towns. The company said yesterday that this area was booming.

Resilient MD Des de Beer said the retail sector had exceeded expectations and that he expected the strong growth to continue for some time.

De Beer said that this set of results were not directly comparable with previous half year figures, as they were being measured against a seven-month period to June last year.

The distribution for a linked unit for the period under review was 42,71c, below the 45,10c for the comparison period.

Resilient said the 10% increase in distribution came from adjusting the figures for measurement over a six-month period.

De Beer attributed the increase in group rental income, from R73,2m to R 97,94m, to the increase in its property portfolio.

Apart from a buoyant retail sector, the company said that its industrial properties showed solid growth and this trend was expected to continue , due to the fact that rentals were still below the level needed to justify new developments.

De Beer said most of the company's retail portfolio was in North West and Limpopo, two provinces where the local economies were growing rapidly.

This was evident in Thohoyandou, where the company recently bought a 10800m² shopping centre for R47m.

The group also planned to develop a regional shopping centre in partnership with the Keystone Investments Group in Kimberley in Northern Cape.

De Beer said Resilient had found a niche for itself in owning commercial properties in small metropolitan areas, and the company had no plans to move away from this strategy.

The group has recently completed extensions to one of its malls in Limpopo. It said the extensions to some of its shopping centres in Rustenburg, Klerksdorp and Makopane would be completed by December.

These shopping centres were being extended to make room for national retail chains like Jet, Ackermans, Pep Stores and Mr Price.

Resilient also disposed of R19,5m worth of property during the period, and a further R52,8m, which is not yet recognised on the balance sheet.

De Beer said the acquisition of a 24,4% holding in Capital Property Fund and a 30% holding in Property Fund Managers in the period was a good investment.