The American Government was assembling a site in Arcadia, Pretoria. They wanted the entire suburban block so they could build the largest embassy in Africa. One property stood between them and the full realisation of their plan, an old home called Arkleton belonging to Dr van Bergen. The Americans appointed an independent valuer to determine the market value of the property. Using all the correct procedures to determine the most probable market value, a valuation of R2 million was established and an attractive cash offer with no suspensive conditions was presented to Dr van Bergen. His first question was: “What do you want to do with my home?” “We want to demolish it,” was the reply. “Never!” exclaimed the doctor, “not for as long as I live.”
When I called on him a few weeks later to enquire if he would consider selling his home, he asked, “Are you here on behalf of the Americans?” I assured him I was not. He told me he was considering selling his home because he had sold his practice and retired. To discover why, then, he was so against selling to the Americans, I probed cautiously. What followed was a remarkable story of how a man feels about his home.
“My wife and I were building our dream home when an estate agent friend of ours told us a marvellous old home had just come onto the market,“ he said. “We explained we had started to build a home and were no longer...
