Improving property fundamentals, which are driving income-distribution growth, continue to be the major contributor to sector performance, the overview, which was released yesterday, says.

The capital markets weakened in August, with the benchmark R153 government bond ending the month at 7,72% compared with 7,56% at the end of July.

The top performer among listed property funds for the month was Apexhi-B, which produced a total return of 16,33%. Siyathenga, which listed on the JSE on August 5, was the next best performer with a total return of 15%.

Nine funds, accounting for about 33% of the sector market capitalisation, declared interim or final results and distributions, Catalyst said.

The weighted average income distribution on these funds was 11%.

The best performer was Spearhead, which achieved distribution growth of 25% on its previous full year distribution. Hyprop (18%), Capital (11,6%) and Resilient (12,25%) all produced double-digit distribution growth.