M5 Global

16/09/2026

The first evidence-led report on South Africa's student accommodation market is out, and it's free.

32 pages. 39 sources. A national grade census of roughly 9,600 accredited properties across seven provinces, built from 1.4 million NSFAS payment records and a working operator's own books.

What a funded bed actually earns, what it costs to run, and what really lands in a landlord's account.

Get it sent straight to your inbox 👇 https://www.rethavanrooyen.com/monitor

16/09/2026

The first evidence-led report on South Africa's student accommodation market is out, and it's free.

32 pages. 39 sources. A national grade census of roughly 9,600 accredited properties across seven provinces, built from 1.4 million NSFAS payment records and a working operator's own books.

What a funded bed actually earns, what it costs to run, and what really lands in a landlord's account.

Get it sent straight to your inbox 👇

The first evidence-led annual report on South Africa's student accommodation market: demand, funding, returns and risk. Free download.

14/09/2026

When the team pulls together, the results speak for themselves. 🔥

🏆 9.7/10 Event Success Rating
📈 +97 NPS Score
🧡 97% Positive Sentiment
🙌 33 out of 34 respondents were Promoters
🚫 Zero detractors

From the planning to the welcome drinks, the driving, the social content, the MC’ing and everything in between, everyone played a part.

This is what happens when great people work towards one goal. 🎯

We didn’t just host a networking event. We created connections, opened doors and built opportunities for tomorrow. 💚

10/09/2026

🏠 NSFAS accreditation shouldn’t feel like guesswork.

My Student House helps property owners get inspection-ready-from identifying what needs fixing and preparing documentation to supporting you through the accreditation process.

08/09/2026

💸 Landlords: NSFAS money doesn’t always arrive when you expect it to — and that can seriously affect your cash flow.

At My Student House, we specialise in student accommodation and understand the complexities that come with NSFAS.

02/09/2026

Launching and unpacking the first edition of the MSH Student Accommodation Monitor: 32 pages, 39 sources, and 1.4 million NSFAS disbursement records across 22 institutions.

Download the full report free: https://www.rethavanrooyen.com/monitor

South Africa has a student accommodation shortfall of roughly 511,600 beds, and a funding system almost nobody outside the industry understands. There is a published cap. There is a very different amount that lands in a landlord's bank account. This session is about the gap between those two numbers, and what it means for students, landlords, investors and policy.

South Africa’s student accommodation market presents a significant investment opportunity, but where is the real demand, what returns are achievable, and where do the risks lie?

In this REI LIVE Webinar, we go beyond the headline student housing shortage to examine the data, economics and market intelligence shaping this increasingly important property sector.

IN THIS WEBINAR, WE DISCUSS:

• The scale of South Africa’s student accommodation shortage and where demand is strongest
• Student rental demand, rents, collections and operating costs
• Returns per bed and why gross yield does not tell the full story
• Which cities, universities and student nodes warrant investor attention
• The economics of buying, converting or building student accommodation
• NSFAS funding, accreditation, payment delays and counterparty risk
• Property transactions, valuations and market intelligence
• The real gap between unmet demand and genuine investment opportunity
• What investors should be watching as the market moves towards 2027

The webinar also coincides with the launch of the South African Student Accommodation Monitor 2026: The Beds. The Money. The Gap., bringing together investor focused research and data to help investors better understand the economics of student accommodation.

PANEL

Retha van Rooyen
Founder & CEO, My Student House

Michelle Dickensen
Payprop

Esteani Marx
BDM, Lightstone Property

MODERATED BY

Neale Petersen
Founder & Editor in Chief, Real Estate Investor

Whether you are an investor, developer, operator, lender or property professional, this discussion provides a data driven look at where the opportunities and risks sit in South Africa’s student accommodation market.

Understand the market. Follow the data. Find the opportunity.



Contact My Student House: [email protected], WhatsApp 084 575 1000

The figures in this session come from the Monitor 2026 and its 39 published sources. Nothing here is financial, investment or legal advice.


https://youtu.be/mx67oxRq8jk

Launching and unpacking the first edition of the MSH Student Accomm...

01/09/2026

🏠 Owning student accommodation shouldn’t mean managing it all yourself.

As student accommodation and NSFAS specialists, we manage the day-to-day so landlords can focus on the bigger picture; protecting their property and growing their investment. 📈

31/08/2026

A student pays a deposit for a room. The room does not exist.
Ask what happens next... Almost nothing happens next.
Not because there is no law. There is a law. Nobody checks it.

In South Africa, a person who takes money for letting or managing someone else's property is a property practitioner. They are supposed to be registered. They are supposed to hold a Fidelity Fund Certificate, which is the thing that means there is money to pay you back when an agent takes yours. Without that certificate, they are not lawfully allowed to be paid at all.

Now go and look at how many people advertising student accommodation and student placements in this country hold one.

There is no student accommodation category in the regulator's system. There is no record of a single disciplinary case in this segment. And at no point does anyone in the funding chain check whether the person taking a student's deposit is registered.

On Friday the regulator made its first real appearance on this topic, at a parliamentary session on student accommodation. It raised the right problems: hidden charges, overcrowding, students being pushed into informal accommodation.
Then it asked for a brand new database of providers.

It did not ask that the agents in this market register under the law that already covers them.

That is the whole story. This is not a hole in the law. It is a hole in enforcement.

What it costs students: no protection when the money disappears, no standard lease, no real complaints route, and no way to check who you are dealing with before you pay. NSFAS students are not allowed to be charged application fees or top-up fees at all. The people charging them are mostly people no regulator has ever heard of.

What it costs the rest of us: no serious funder will put money behind an
industry it cannot verify, and every operator who does things properly competes on price against people carrying none of the cost of doing things properly.

Three fixes. None of them need a new law.
1) Create a student accommodation category so the segment is visible.
2) Check registration at accreditation. It is one field on a form.
3) A standard disclosure on every student lease, so a student can see who they are contracting with.

I am a registered property practitioner. That should be boring. In this industry it is not.

If you are a parent, ask the question before you pay. If you are a landlord, ask who is managing your building and whether they are registered.
The full picture of how this market actually works, with the payment data behind it, is in the Student Accommodation Monitor 2026. It is free.

The first evidence-led annual report on South Africa's student accommodation market: demand, funding, returns and risk. Free download.

29/08/2026

I sat through Friday's parliamentary colloquium on student accommodation. I was so excited about this as it was the first time so many stakeholders got together in one (virtual) room. So obviously i had to listen to all of it.

As expected, although I was a bit disappointed, no one wanted to put an actual number on the table and no decisions were made, so was this just another play for time or the beginning of proper engagement? I guess time will tell.

One thing stood out. An industry body put its own cost numbers on the table in front of Parliament.

I ran those numbers through the model we built independently, months ago, without any access to their data.

Their required figure and mine differ by less than one percent.

Two organisations, working separately, from different data, arriving at almost the same answer. That is usually the point where you stop arguing about whether a number is right and start arguing about what to do with it.

I have written up what the cap should actually be, and why, in this week's newsletter. The full research paper sits behind it.

Start here:

The first evidence-led annual report on South Africa's student accommodation market: demand, funding, returns and risk. Free download.