 Good evening, and welcome to episode 315 of the Private Property Podcast. I'm your host, Oza Mandoumoa Komalo. It's the Wednesday edition of the Private Property Podcast, and as you know, every second Wednesday we have somebody from the Apsahome Loos team joining us, and I'll be introducing two amazing women from the Apsahome Loos team that we're going to be talking to. If you're joining us for the first time, welcome to it. You're tuned in to the only Daily Property Podcast in South Africa. Do make sure that you go over to our Facebook or our YouTube page to catch up on all the great content that you've already missed out on. And to all our regular viewers on Facebook, on Instagram as well, as on YouTube, welcome back. It certainly is great to have you with us. You know how we do it. Every single week that you and I have an appointment at 7pm, we're always tackling a hot property topic and in conversation with experts to help us make better property decisions. And that's exactly what we're going to be doing this evening. But before we get to that, as you know, we are running an incredible competition on our social media pages. You probably would have seen it on Facebook, where we are certainly counting down to reaching one million followers on our Facebook page. We've shared all the great competition details on Facebook. So do make sure that you go there to check it out. We want to make sure that we reach the one million followers. We want to get more people watching us, more people engaging with us. And of course, more people commenting at home. So do remember to also share the live that you, as you are watching us at home, especially over on Facebook so that more of your friends and family can see that you're always tuned into the private property podcast every single weekdays at 7pm. All you have to do at home to stand a chance of walking away with some cash for this particular competition is, of course, tune in every day and watch us live in the private property podcast. Myself is Amandoumo Akumalo and Edrand in cash. We will be announcing the winner halfway through the show. So halfway through the show, I will say this is the person who has commented the most and that has been randomly selected to walk away with the cash prize. And you have to claim the prize while we are still live on A, because if you don't claim the prize while the show is still live, then it rolls over. So the money bag can certainly get bigger and bigger and bigger at home. So if you want to share, make sure that you participate, comment, share as much as you can, then also tune in live so that should you your name be called after you are able to claim your prize. That certainly is that easy for you to walk away with 500 Reins in cash. I know that it has rolled over from yesterday. We didn't have somebody claiming their money in time. So it has rolled over this evening so you can look forward to standing a chance of even winning more cash. So do watch out for that. So if you know that you have, you know, into the competition, you stand a chance of walking away with 1,500 Reins this evening. So you definitely do want to get your hands on that cash. Well, this evening, as I said, we're tackling something that I'm very excited about, as you all know, and with two amazing women from the Accessible Blues team, we're going to be looking at women changing the face of home ownership. A lot of us know how, as women, we're certainly playing a huge role in changing how home ownership looks like. And we're going to get a really great sense of the exchange to which we've done that. And some of the things that women absolutely have to be aware of throughout their home ownership journey and help us get a better sense of how we are changing the shape of home ownership this evening. I'm joined by Zeta Manuel, who's a portfolio manager. The first time home buyers market at Apsa Home Loans, as well as Kaminye Ramsemi, who is the head of risk management acquisitions at Apsa Home Loans. Ladies, good evening and thank you so much for joining us on the show. Zamaa, nice to be here. Thanks for having us again. You know, Kaminye, I want to start with you on this one. When we reflect on the history of women owning property in South Africa, we know that women of colour have been particularly excluded from buying property and even denied access to credit. Perhaps take us through, let's take the historical context for us because I think it's so important to just understand how far we've come as women in our ability to even get something like credit. To do whatever it is that we want to do with it. Yeah, I guess we've certainly come a long way, Zamaa. I mean, there were times when women did not even have rights to own property, you know, and I mean, look at us now. We all we enjoy full property ownership. If you think back many, many years ago, if a woman had to bring a property into into the marriage, you know, in a trust, the husband actually enjoyed, you know, full, the husband had full control over that property because women were actually seen as as minors, you know, and it's really only in the in the early 1970s when women started to apply for for credit lines, you know, and apply for property finance. And still there there was a challenge because women were seen as a thin file, you know, not having enough credit or, you know, any credit lines. And that posed a challenge in terms of how women were assessed at that point in time. And I guess when property ownership or property finance essentially opened up to women, black women were also excluded from that. And it's really only in the in 1996, you know, when, you know, the Bill of Rights, women were actually seen as equal citizens. And so we had challenges. We had challenges with black women who were married under the customary law, you know, and they they had challenges with owning land. And it was really only in 2018 when the Constitutional Court recognized the rights for women to own land. So whether you're living in South Africa, whether you're living, you know, outside South Africa, we as women, you know, in a matter of your your race, your color, your marital status, we've really come a long way when it comes to property ownership. And I guess also just having that having that full financial as a woman and I think it's such an important one. And I certainly want to, you know, see the green hearts from particularly the women this evening. And it can be whether you are a woman who is a home owner, a woman who's renting, because I think we take it for granted how much it also just takes for you as a woman to find your own place and rent by yourself or perhaps rent with your friends. It really is a big step to be able to have your own place that you call your own. So it doesn't matter whether you're renting or you've gone and taken it to the next level of buying your own home. I want to see the green hearts from your home. So a woman who's living in her own place, bought her own property. I certainly do want to see more of you raising your hands. And Zeta, when we look at then, you know, the motivations driving women into home ownership, can you share with us what some of them specifically tend to be, you know, when you look at some of the trends where women opt to buy their own homes? I think home ownership indeed is murdering change in the economic power between men and women. And there's an increase in women entering the employment, the formal employment sector, which enables them an increase in salary, taking up different leadership roles, and that gives them access to to higher incomes and access to actually enter the property market as such. And I think that then enables some women even to start thinking of investing in property, purchasing their first or even trying to grow a property portfolio. There's women that are also seeking a single woman, seeking security for their kids from a long term perspective. Also, women looking to, as mentioned, grow in a property portfolio or future investments. There's also some young families who are looking to going from renting a property to owning a property as such. And then, of course, we have some women, our first generation in their families to go to university, enter formal employment and is actually seeking to buy a home for the extended family. And I think all of these factors, they're really these drivers of women participating and being economically active and also entering the property market. And I think it also gives you a sense of independence and security. And that it's a need and definitely something that a lot of us despite, but especially something really big for women, as Carmeni has mentioned, we've come a long way. And certainly have come a long way. Of course, of course, if you join us, we're looking at home ownership, the women changing the face of home ownership in South Africa. I want to hear from the women at home, whether you're a home owner yourself or you're renting, I want to see those green hearts down here below. Just so other women who are probably still thinking about especially home ownership are still maybe on the fence and also want to get a bit of encouragement of seeing other women being able to do it. Because I know one of the things that I also struggled with quite a lot when I first kind of started getting serious about wanting my own home and wanted to buy a home was I was in my early 20s, sort of 22, 23. And I started working and I started viewing different properties and just feeling very anxious about that first buy and even feeling more anxious about taking on such a huge debt. I think at the time I was looking at like two bedroom apartments and they were going for like anything between like your 400 to I think I was looking to just under 515. And just the thought of taking on that, I'm out of there. I was like, oh my God, this is so much money. And I mean, one of the considerations and I always kick myself when I talk about this because I know that it's sort of a reality now. But certainly back then, I mean, this is what about 7 or so years ago was I was very single. And we're not having like hashtags like builds with title deeds, for example, on your social media. So young women buying properties was not quite a thing as it is now. And I love that we've made it a thing. And there was a sense of anxiety around, oh my God, I'm single. Maybe first sort of wait to get partnered and get in a very serious relationship before thinking of buying my own property. And I think when we look at other young women who've been able to buy a property and unmarried or if you're single, it certainly is encouraging. And I think it's one of those things where you know that as a woman, you're also giving each other permission to do it, that you shouldn't have the fear based on not being married or not being in a serious relationship. So ladies, I certainly do want to see more of those bean hearts from you down here below because we know how that that's a thing we think about. Sometimes I don't want to publicly admit it, but it certainly is something that we consider. And I see some of the love that we're really getting on our Facebook page from Ukutso Ramushale. I see you sharing shares. Naidu, I see you. We've also got a Kenan McLaren I also see. And I think one of the really great things about being able to, certainly for me, you know, buying a property young and then being very scared and then only a few years later buying it, I kicked myself in the foot because when I look at the same properties I was viewing, when I was 22, when I started getting serious again, so at about 26, I saw the, and this is in the mid-19th era, so I have to give context. You know, I was saying, I was looking at 400 to 550, there's very same properties, very same complexes are now going for 800, even 900k. I know not every area appreciates like that, but it certainly gives me context. So if I understand, you know, property a bit more and put work into understanding the context, there certainly is a lot of potential even into, you know, I want to bring you in, when we then look at some of the trends and when it comes to, you know, trends that we're seeing when women are buying capsules with us, what some of the trends we're seeing in terms of women owners in South Africa. The trends are actually quite interesting because what we see is we see more females on properties than men. So we saw that trend peak over and we've seen that post us coming out of the hard lockdown into age two. So it's very, very interesting. We saw an increase in first-time home buyer, female first-time home buyers. You know, we see an increase in single female buyers as well. So I think it's also very nice when you're looking at those trends to look at the age bands, to look at the reason for buying the property, are females buying it because it's a first-time property, it's used for investment, you know, what are the average purchase prices, the dynamics across the different regions that we're seeing. So I think just look at the age band, which is actually quite interesting. There's this disparity on the, you know, on the tails of the age bands. So what you actually see on the age band where consumers are below 30 years old, you find that we have more males who buy properties there. And if you look at the age bands that are 50 years plus, you find they're more females than males that buy properties there. Now, in the early 20s or under 30s, we have more males because males are more prone to take risks, you know, they buy properties at a younger age, they make good returns, you know. But women are also like you say in the 20s, they're a little bit less confident, less bold about making that decision. You know, I was 26 when I bought the first property and I must admit, I thought I was signing my life away, you know, it was quite a daunting, quite a daunting experience. It's nice to see now, it's very nice to see now, you know, coming out of COVID as well, a lot of young women under the age of 35 buying their first property, being bold about that, about taking that decision, you know, very good trends there. The 50 plus women are more established, you know, if you look at the women, a lot more women are working now, a lot more women are taking on senior roles, they've earned leadership roles, you know, they're much more financially stable. So as they get older, they will tend to look at investing in that security, investing in that asset, you know, trying to control assets and trying to, you know, achieve much more of their financial independence that they've had throughout. So I think you see a lot of that in the 50 plus. What's also interesting, if you look at across the different regions in South Africa, what we have seen in early 2021, we've seen more property applications in cutting case a day for females than for males. I'm talking single females now. The other interesting thing, if you look at, you know, the reason, we still have more males buying properties to invest than females, but we're starting to see an increase in females buying properties for investment. And I think lastly, the average purchase price tend to buy more or buy properties with a higher purchase price than women. But we're now also seeing women starting to buy high price properties or the average purchase prices of properties that a woman are buying have actually increased by around 30% year on year. That's quite, that's very interesting to see. And I think it's nice to see women coming out there, women now buying properties and making those big, big decisions. And it's absolutely incredible to see that as community's point of art. We've seen the love that we're getting from you in social media, especially on our Facebook live. I see you messy NEPD as well as Kellen Alvence. And of course, I want to see more of those green hearts, especially to the women who are home owners right now. And as we're looking at, you know, women changing the face of home ownership, we've got a comment coming through from Ubu Thale Ramurula saying women are definitely changing the face of home ownership. Indeed, hashtag one million followers. And on that hashtag of one million followers, we are of course going to announce the lucky winner who's standing, who's certainly standing a chance of walking away with that 1,500 rands if they claim their money before the end of the show. Let's see what that lucky winner who's been randomly, certainly going to be randomly selected is going to be. And that lucky winner is Upesi Dombela. So Pesi Dombela, we certainly want to hear from you. So make sure that you message us in order to claim your price. Today, you're going to walk away with that 1,500 rands. Remember, you have to do it while we are still live. And if Pesi Dombela doesn't get back to us in time, then the money is going to roll over in the money bag. So Pesi Dombela, make sure that you certainly get back to us before the end of the show. Now, Kamini, I want to bring you back. When we look at, you know, the interest rates, one of the conversations I always have, I always feel as though as particularly unmarried women, we tend to get unfavorable interest rates. You know, I see it in almost every quote I get. And when I do a comparison to some of my, you know, female friends who are married, I find that the comparatives don't quite stack up. And I know that different factors typically go into it. But our risks profiles are relatively similar. Now, can women receive favorable interest rates when it comes to accessing a home loan? Because as I said, I already have that perception about things like my insurance and every other thing I have to get quoted on. So when it comes to then that the home loan interest rates, how favorable are there is when it comes to women in general, but also I'm married for this. So when you apply for a, for a home loan, okay, we have the banks with the financial institutions have to first try and assess the risk of the customer, the risk of the deal. Okay, so in order to do that, we would look at your historic prepayment behavior. We would look at affordability, which is very much aligned to the National Credit Act Amendment. We would look at how much of skin you are putting into the game, for example, the deposit that you're putting into the property that you're purchasing. So we look at that criteria in terms of trying to determine a risk. Some financial institutions could also look at the area that you're buying the property and that would determine overall risk of what we call the deal or the application. And then obviously, once we determine that, we price for the risk. Now let's go back to the risk assessment. Like I said, affordability is very much straightforward there. When it comes to determining the, the probability or the, you know, what is the likelihood that you will actually repay this home loan, they're different tools that means, you know, their scorecards, there's risk assessment models. And if I think back more than 10, 12 years ago, the credit bureaus used to have demographic scorecards and behavioral scorecards. Demographic would, you know, consist of things like marital status, gender, but financial institutions, when it comes to traditional tools, it's moved away from a lot of those demographics, you know, in assessing a customer. Marital status may still fair in some of those traditional models, but it's very much obviously driven by past behavior, historic behavior. What we have seen in the past is that women do have better, or tend to repay a home loan better than, than males. But in traditional models, they really would use these types of demographics. And if you do the waiting on these demographics is actually very low in terms of making that decision for the customer. However, you know, there are things like machine learning models or tools where we've now advanced. And with machine learning, you tend to use a lot of factors, you know, to try and slice and dice the, that customer to determine a more accurate view of the, of the risk of that deal. And what you find in the machine learning models, they would tend to have a lot more demographics there. But like I've said, the waiting of those demographics is actually very low in terms of the making that decision. If you find a tool that is heavily weighted towards females or towards Marital status, I would deem that to be quite a weak tool. Now, going back to the price, once you we determine the risk of that customer, within price for that risk, of course, when it comes to women's month, there could be campaigns in the market, you know, we could have financial institutions saying women would get a preferential rate in the month of August. But from a business as usual, there's no preferential rates for or price for a woman versus a male. And I want to bring you in on this one. So if we're not getting special rates because we're women, and already, you know, my general stance is women should be paying less for a lot of things because we labor so much in so many other areas. But unfortunately, your business doesn't quite work like that, particularly in this particular front. So if we're not getting special rates, because we're women, how can we as women, you know, best position ourselves to be able to get good rates? So what are some of the other factors or things that we can do in order to be applying for a women's facility? So Zama, I think the first thing is the best thing to do is to educate yourself, you teach yourself prepared for home ownership. And what is it actually all about the property market? So at EPSO, we have a great pre-binding educational tools that's available on our EPSO website that is accessible to open market use. And these tools will help you make the best decisions and really educate you about the journey you would embark on, you know. So we've got great tools such as a pre-qualification tool, which is our home loan estimator. This will help you to determine what you could qualify for from an affordability perspective before you start shopping around for your property. Our second great digital tool that we have is our EPSO My Home Owner Journey. It's an e-learning home ownership educational tool. It teaches you all the ins and outs of home ownership, the entire buying process, registration process, maintenance process. So I think it's really great to have that in this insight about home ownership, you know, different type of properties, different the attorney processes, building a property versus buying a freestanding property as an example. We also have other great tools such as a Knowledge Hub Center. We've got a lot of different articles that speaks about home ownership and property-related matters. And then, of course, they're all available on EPSO website. We've got great bond calculators to help you make those sums to determine what your affordability, what does your budget look like as well, and what would be the cost of some of the attorney fees associated to the property that you're interested in purchasing. And these calculators can help you, you know, work out your sums based on your budget and your affordability. And then also, you know, from a women perspective, there's different networks and organizations out there that really empowers women and drives thought leadership such as the woman property network. They're really there to drive thought leadership to learn, connect, empower women in the property and home ownership market. And I think these organizations is good also to join and listen to conversations because they really empower women, you know, to enter the property market and to learn more about it and be brave and bold as well. And I think talking of networks like your women property network, it's such an incredible network. I'm a part of it. And some of the great events that they host are so beneficial, I think to women who are in the property sector or looking to certainly have a better understanding of how to navigate, you know, the industry as real estate professionals. The last month, there was actually even a great session that they had around women on boats and sort of helping women want to get on boats, obviously women within the sector who are looking to get on boats and how to best equip yourself. And really having such an interesting conversation about even some of the I'll say insecurities women face when it comes to the board conversation and how we can best navigate it as much as possible. So it really is beneficial. And I always say, try to join different kinds of networks or different kinds of communities where you're able to learn as much as you can about home ownership. And I think one of the really great ones of course is watching the show every weekday at seven. We still have a great community on our Facebook page. We were very encouraging when it comes to your home ownership journey and helping you make sense of some of the things that you might be struggling with. Now, Zeta, before we wrap up, you know, I know that APSA doesn't have any propositions, you know, specifically for women when it comes to your home ownership. But perhaps share one is that we certainly have must be aware of or should be aware of as women that APSA does have that we're also able to take advantage of. Thanks, Amma. We've got great products available to the market right from a first time buyer buying your home for the second time or you'd like to be an investor. We've got we've got tailor made solutions. So from a first time buyer perspective, we've got my home proposition, which really gives you access to a 50% attorney discount, access to our financial planning consultants that can give you a financial needs analysis, and also access to a free home ownership course that teaches you more the ins and outs of home ownership. And we have a great proposition for young professionals where we often earn a loan of up to 105% home loan offering. We give you access to our various insurance solutions, which is important when you purchase a home, you've got to make sure you make a good choice around the insurance solutions, we give you an attorney discount on your bond registration costs. And of course, you can also then ensure that you manage your asset by drafting a will with the bank and ensuring that you leave your asset to somebody in case of so that you can plan accordingly. And then for investors, we've got a great investor offering. Our buy to let offering is really great. We do we offer great tools and tenant management solutions. We also consider future rental income as part of your assessment for affordability as part of the application. And I think for more information about our offerings and our products that we have, you can visit our app's website. But as I mentioned, we've got tailor made offerings for the different type of property for the customer in the market that wants to purchase property. Thanks. And I do urge, you know, particular women to check out some of the different offers because I think one of the things, especially if I look at first time home buyers, is that they typically tend to not know about the different things that you must budget for. And if you're a young professional, you're certainly able to take advantage of that 105% home loan. And even if you already have funds identified, you know, qualifying for a bigger amount when you've already put down that deposit and you had the funds, you know, to pay for the transfer, it helps you in the long run if you want to be able to access that money within the home loan facility. So they're always creative ways that you're able to take advantage of having taken up a slightly higher bond. And that's if you're just savvy about it. And of course, if you probably want to go into investing in property. Before I let you go, I think, Kamini, last one from your side, any final tips, particularly for women, you know, this women's month who are exploring getting into property or exploring, you know, making that leap and buying their first property. Look, I think women are all women are very, very modest, we're very humble, you know, we you know, in our minds, we rock stars, we do 100 things and we are, you know, we achieve a lot, but we don't make it vocal. You know, if you want to obviously take your place on the table, you know, you want to make a big bold decision, make it heard, be more vocal, it's women's month, you know, having that big advice to women, share your stories as well. If you bought property, share those stories, share your experiences, you don't know who you might inspire to buy their first property. And Xavier, on your end, any final words for the women at home or watching us when it comes to their home ownership journey? I think we play different roles in society, Zama. We are multifaceted in different ways and I think we should own our success in whichever form that we achieve success. We should own it, we should empower ourselves and influence others too. You know, as Carmen mentioned, share your story, own your success, be an influence to somebody else. And we bold and brave and we play many roles. And purchasing property is a sense of security and independence. And I think that's something that really is really empowering to many. And I think as a female, own your success, own your success and speak about it and be one of the women that lifts others up. So rise as we rise as we live. So I think that that's that's important, you know, empowered women empowers others. And I think that's that's the narrative that I'd like to leave for this evening. Thanks. And it's a great note to leave it at brag about your successes. And it can be whether you're renting out your apartment, whether you've bought in your apartment, whether you've bought a new rug for your apartment, no expensive rugs are you've just, you know, remodeled part of your home, whatever it is, don't be scared to brag about it. I know that we tend to feel some type of way, especially when it comes to bragging about some of our successes. But we are going to leave it there this evening. Zeta and Camini, thank you so much for joining us on the show. Thanks very much. Thank you. And that is Camini Ramsemi, who is the head of risk management positions at Apsa Home Loans, as well as Zeta Manhoes, the portfolio manager of first time home buys, also from the Apsa Home Loans team. We didn't hear from Ukesi Dombela, who was going to be the winner of that 1500 rounds. So it does roll over to tomorrow. So remember, participating, you know that you've shared, you know that you've commented, you know that you've tagged your friends, make sure that you watch the show live. So if you call your name, you can be able to claim your prize. Tomorrow it's going to be even more money. I want to give this money away. We haven't had a winner since we've started, it keeps rolling over. I mean, I guess the rule over is great for once it reaches a certain amount, whoever wins ends up, you know, winning a big amount of money. But do make sure that if you've entered, you watch the show live so that you can claim your prize. Well, that's where I'm going to leave it this evening on the private property podcast with myself is Amantou Mokumalo. It has been a pleasure to be with you. I see we keep having more and more internet issues. We're going to certainly get to it. I don't know why the internet gods are against us these days, but we're certainly going to risk it and bring more of my face during the show. Well, I'm going to leave you in the very capable hands of the first time home buy stroke with Estie Carson coming to your screens at 8 p.m. The absolutely phenomenal Lulema Zekira is Estie's guest. You do not want to miss that one at 8 p.m. I'll be back on your screens tomorrow at 7 until then hoping you're staying home and staying safe.