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There are not many properties that come with a three-century paper trail. Bloemendal Wine Estate in Durbanville, on the northern fringe of Cape Town, is one of them, and it is going under the hammer this month.
Rawson Auctions has set a minimum bid of R180 million for the sale, scheduled for Wednesday, March 25. Interested buyers will need to show up with more than just a cheque book. The auctioneer is requiring proof of funds of at least R200 million, along with verified identity and tax registration documents. A non-refundable deposit of 5% of the purchase price is due once an offer is accepted, with the remaining balance payable within 14 days.
The estate stretches across nearly 239 hectares, with about 128 hectares under vine. It produces roughly 130,000 bottles of wine per year from varietals including Chenin Blanc, Chardonnay, Pinotage and Cabernet Sauvignon, and its grapes also supply neighbouring producers including Durbanville Hills. Beyond the vineyards, the property includes a manor house, restaurants, a wine-tasting room, a winery, conference venues, guesthouses and stables. It goes to market as a going concern, meaning a buyer is acquiring a fully operational business, not a blank canvas.
The estate's origins date to 1702, when it was producing fresh vegetables and livestock supplies for Dutch East India Company ships rounding the Cape of Good Hope. The historic Kanonberg sits on the property, from which cannons once fired to signal that produce was ready for passing vessels. Three centuries later, its fields are growing award-winning wine instead of trading post provisions.
The modern winemaking chapter began in 1920, when Jannie van der Westhuizen built the estate's first cellar. His son planted significant Cabernet Sauvignon and Shiraz in the early 1960s. His grandson Jackie Coetzee later registered it formally as an estate in 1987 and built its international reputation before selling in 2008, saying he was ready to move on to another chapter of his life.
That 2008 sale brought Bloemendal its most politically charged chapter of ownership. Mvelaphanda Holdings, a company founded by Tokyo Sexwale, acquired the estate for R105 million at auction. Sexwale is one of the more remarkable figures in post-apartheid South Africa. He was arrested in 1976 as a young activist and sentenced to 18 years on Robben Island, where he served time alongside Nelson Mandela. After his release and the dawn of democracy, he became the first democratically elected Premier of Gauteng in 1994, governing the province that is home to Johannesburg.
He left government in 1998, and what followed was a formidable business career, built largely on mining and investment. In the late 1990s, both Sexwale and current President Cyril Ramaphosa were floated as possible successors to Mandela. Neither got the job. Thabo Mbeki did.
It is unclear who currently holds title to the farm. Mvelaphanda's subsidiary has held it since the 2008 purchase.
This is not the first time the estate has been listed in recent memory. A 2025 auction attempt with a reserve price of R250 million attracted what was reportedly an accepted bid, but the buyer, rumored to be a local investor, could not arrange full funding. That sale collapsed. The March 25 auction represents a second attempt, this time at a lower opening threshold of R180 million.
Real estate agents familiar with the Durbanville market note that agricultural land in the area typically starts at around R1 million per hectare, which would place Bloemendal's land value at close to R240 million on acreage alone, before accounting for infrastructure, water rights, the winery, hospitality facilities or the brand.
There has been a surge of foreign investment in Cape wine properties over the past several years, with at least a dozen commercial farms sold to offshore investment consortiums since 2018, several changing hands at prices north of R80 million. Heritage properties of Bloemendal's scale rarely surface publicly. Most transactions of this scale happen quietly, off-market, without public price disclosure.
Tanya Jovanovski of Rawson Properties said significant interest has already been registered ahead of the auction and the firm expects competitive bidding. Whoever wins on March 25 will not just be buying land and wine. They will be taking custody of one of the oldest continuously operating agricultural properties in South Africa, one with roots deep enough to predate the country itself by more than a century.
