In 2018, an estimated R15,2 billion was paid out in terms of salaries and wages to employees across all economic sectors. This amounted to roughly 84.7% of total district salaries and wages and 35.4% of the provincial total.

Of total salaries and wages in Sol Plaatje municipal area, 6.7% resulted from payouts within the primary sector, 8.4% within the secondary sector, and 84.9% from payouts within the tertiary sector. The tertiary sector within Sol Plaatje municipal area contributes 43.1% to the total tertiary sector of the Northern Cape Province.

The annual growth rate for the number of households within the African population declined at 0.3% between 2009 and 2017. For the same period, the Coloured population group increased with 3.8%. The average annual growth of the total households saw an increase of 1.6% from 2004 to 2016.

The average household size in 2010 was approximately 3.8 individuals per household as compared to the 2.4 persons per household in 2018. This is as a result of a higher growth in the number of households as compared to the growth in the population in the Northern Cape Province.

In terms of demand, an important factor from the above is that the bulk of the increase in number of households are situated in both Galeshewe and the previous coloured areas, which in terms of locality are further from the CBD and places of employment and are already extensively built up and have no potential for developing additional houses, than is the case with Hull Street.

Housing remains a major challenge in the Sol Plaatje Municipality with housing backlogs currently standing at 12,000 units. This is evident by the number of informal (illegal) settlements that have sprung out over the past decade. Nine of the 21 informal settlements have since been formally registered and declared as townships.

The Northern Cape Province has an MTSF (Medium Term Strategic Framework) target of 565 social housing units, and to date zero units have been delivered and the Province has merely two (2) conditionally accredited SHIs (SASIHC & Afrikaya Housing Development Agency).

SASIHC, together with COGHSTA and the SHRA, are currently pursuing a social housing project that will yield 373 units for the current financial year and 227 for the 2020/21 financial year.

Sol Plaatje Municipality has a total of 1092 rental units that are located in the CBD, Roodepan, Galeshewe and Kenilworth. This includes municipal owned flats and a total of 77 units reserved for the purpose of an old-age facility. The municipality has undertaken to study and identify new pockets of suitable and strategical located land for low-cost housing, which included BNG.

The shortage of suitable land for low - cost and middle-income households is the most prevalent and the need to service the gap-market and the middle-income group is of critical importance.