Merger and takeover activity in South Africa's listed property market is expected to hot up considerably over the next few months as dominant players vie more aggressively than ever for a slice of the JSE's R105bn real estate sector

South Africa’s R105bn listed property sector finds itself in somewhat of a catch-22 situation. On the one hand it wants to attract meaningful foreign investment; on the other it hardly has enough scrip to satisfy local demand

Capital Property Fund, which is part of the Resilient Group stable of listed property funds, has announced that Barry Stuhler has resigned as MD of the listed property unit trust

Resilient Property Income Fund and its sister company have acquired an effective 10% interest in JSE-listed Pangbourne Properties in a move described by Pangbourne CEO Craig Hutchison as a 'hostile attempt to take over the company by stealth'

At the moment the sector is doing extremely well from a fundamental on the ground nuts and bolts kind of view

Listed property loan stock company has announced a R184m empowerment deal for two broad-based empowerment consortiums to acquire altogether 15% of the company

Listed sister property companies Pangbourne Properties, iFour Properties, Siyathenga Property Fund and Monyetla Pro-perty Fund have created significant cost savings for themselves by concluding SA's first multiborrower, commercial mortgage-backed securitisation transaction.

SA's listed property funds are in a race for size that could leave the 26-fund, R94bn market cap sector with five or six giants and a few dwarves

Ask any analysts or fund manager if there are any cheap steals left in the listed property sector and the unanimous answer is "no". After all, the sector is trading at an average 56% premium to net asset value.

Listed property company Monyetla Property Fund, formerly Calulo Property Fund, will issue new units to raise about R353m, which will be partly used to fund a property transaction with parent company Pangbourne Properties.