Masdar To Delay Final Completion Until At Least 2020

Final completion of Masdar City, the carbon-neutral development being built just outside Abu Dhabi, will be delayed until at least 2020, four years after its original deadline.

In an emailed statement released to Dow Jones, the government-backed renewable energy company said the city’s first phase would now be completed in 2015. It also stated that completion on the site would not take place until between 2020 and 2025.

Masdar also added that it may also bring in renewable power from external sources, contrary to its initial plan to use only onsite resources.

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Service Fee Defaulters Face Losing Their Homes

Dubai homeowners who have failed to pay off the service fee will now have to wash their hands off from their property.

The Dubai Land Department will repossess and auction off the homes of those who fail to pay maintenance fees as part of the emirate’s new strata law, according to an official notice issued yesterday.

As developers hand over the maintenance of shared buildings and communities to homeowners associations, hundreds of owners who owe thousands of dirhams in service charges risk losing their properties.


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UAE Banks To Make Dh3bn In Dubai World Provisions

The UAE banks could book up to Dh3 billion in provisions related to Dubai World's debt restructuring in the second half of this year, dampening the banking industry's performance, according to investment bank Shuaa Capital.

Sofia El Boury, a banking analyst at Shuaa Capital's Research Department, said all of the UAE banks have not come clear on their exposure to Dubai World "provisions which could range between Dh2 billion to Dh3bn in the second half considering the latest data."

Saudi Mortgage Law To Focus On Affordable Housing Shortage

Experts have raised a warning against the lack of low-cost accommodation in Saudi Arabia. According to real estate experts, this shortage in the affordable property will reflect in the agenda of the mortgage law, which Saudi Arabia is planning to implement soon.

“Most new developments are targeting the high-income segments of the population which constitute a relatively small share of existing demand,” said Rakesh Kunhiraman, who is the director at the consulting division of Oxford Business Group (OBG).

House prices on Palm Jumeirah sink to three year low

Since the start of the property crash in late 2008, prices have now fallen by nearly 70 percent in some parts of the Palm, though across the development the average drop is believed to be closer to 40 percent.

In May this year the Arabian Business Think Tank forecast that prices on the Palm Jumeirah will plummet another 20 percent in the next year. It predicted that average prices for an apartment on Nakheel's man-made island will fall to just AED1,022 per square foot by May 2011.

Meanwhile the latest data from real estate consultancy Colliers said that house prices across Dubai fell by four percent in the second quarter, according to the latest data from real estate consultancy Colliers.

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Dubai Municipality To Use RERA Index

Dubai Municipality has come up with a new set of rules for the house owners of Dubai. The owners will now have to pay 5% Dubai Municipality (DM) housing fee, even if the property is vacant, provided there is a DEWA connection.

The Dubai Municipality has also mentioned that it is not ready to withstand any kind of cheating the residents are showcasing by listing rents which are very much below the prevailing market rates for the specific region. According to municipality, it will be forced to use RERA, the Real Estate Regulatory Agency, rent index if any kind of malpractice is witnessed.

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Jumeirah To Manage Egyptian Luxury Resort

Dubai-based luxury hospitality firm, Jumeriah Group, has disclosed on Monday, 02.08.2010, that it will be overseeing a new deluxe resort located in Egypt. The luxury hospitality organization has mentioned that a deal has been struck with Egypt’s leading development company, Palm Hills Development for the management of Jumeirah Gamsha Bay Resort. The Jumeriah Resort is situated in the Palm Gamsha resort constructed by PHD on Red Sea, Egypt.

Jumeriah will be managing 250-room multi-purpose hotel of Palm Gamsha. It is a comprehensive community and has 20 artificial islands designed as a sea horse. The resort is situated to the north west of Hurghada airport at a distance of 47 km.

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REIDIN.com index reveals 6.99% increase in Dubai villa sales price between Q2 2009 and Q2 2010

REIDIN.com, the leading real estate information company covering emerging markets has today announced the June figures of its Sales Price Index for Dubai (SPID) part of its INDEXFocus-UAE product, an online database of proprietary real estate indices for UAE designed to accurately track price fluctuations in the residential real estate market.

INDEXFocus is a service dedicated to providing real estate indicies and other benchmark data. Sales Price Index for Dubai (SPID) is launched by REIDIN.com based on the actual transactions in an exclusive partnership with the Real Estate Regulatory Agency (RERA) and the Dubai Land Department (DLD). The service provides the Dubai market with a series of indices and data sets that can help improve transparency across the market and help real estate professionals to benchmark and analyse residential price trends.

Power and water cut from 1,654 Dubai homes in H1

Nearly 4,400 houses in Dubai have been found violating building and construction rules during the first half of 2010 as part of the One Villa, One Family campaign, a senior official has said. Omar AbdulRahman, head of Building Inspection Section at Dubai Municipality, said that 40,707 houses in Dubai had been inspected since start of the initiative aimed at reducing overcrowding in properties in the emirate.

AbdulRahman said about 1,654 houses had had its power and water cut off as a result of violations. He added that surprise visits in coordination with various government departments would continue and fines would be imposed. He said violations included bachelors staying in family areas, and multiple families staying in one house.

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The Nation Investor Planning Two Private Equity Deals

Abu Dhabi-based investment service provider, The National Investor, has plans for closing two “substantial” private equity deals by 2010 end. “We have capital to invest; we generally do about two deals a year and we will do the same this year”, said the TNI private equity director Yahya Jalil.

He also mentioned that TNI was honing on ‘something substantial’ at present, but declined to disclose the details of the massive transactions.

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Abu Dhabi To Have 73,000 New Homes By 2013

According to reports from the UAE newspaper, The National, 20% of the new residential properties being developed in Abu Dhabi, the capital of UAE, will be set aside to meet the housing requirements of middle income group while the rent of a studio will be as minimum as Dh 25,200 per annum. Michael White, who is a senior planning manager at Urban Planning Council, Abu Dhabi, has mentioned that the initial set of homes which are being developed in sync with the new rules will be launched in the real estate market “probably within the next year or two”.

According to the council, out of the 73,000 homes slated to be constructed by 2013, 15,000 will be earmarked for middle income group. The rents will be somewhere around 35% of the income of the household. For those who want to enjoy reduced rent rates, the income should be within the upper ceiling of Dh 252,000.

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Drake & Scull Wins Dohaland Flagship Cooling Project

The 182-million-Qatari-riyal worth design and development contract for the two cooling plants at Dohaland’s Musheireb project has been awarded to Drake & Scull International’s arm, Drake & Scull Water and Power. The firm will be responsible for the comprehensive design and development of these cooling plants which have cooling towers and chiller plants. The district cooling has a refrigeration capacity of 29,250 tonnes.

According to Mohammad Masoud Al Merri, Director-Projects, Dohaland, “We are delighted to award the design and build contract to Drake and Scull for the district cooling plants for the Musheireb project”. According to the contract, the designing and building of hilled water reticulation network having valves and valve chambers, the mechanical electrical and plumbing services, testing and commissioning of the plants will all be taken care of by Drake & Scull.

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Dubai Properties Group Sees Surge in Demand Following Leasing Campaign

Dubai Properties Group (DPG), a member of Dubai Holding, today announced a significant increase in demand for its built-to-lease communities throughout Dubai as UAE residents opt for quality and location at excellent value for money.

The increased demand is the direct result of DPG’s comprehensive six-week-long campaign to promote its built-to-lease communities across Dubai. DPG has received thousands of calls each week driving hundreds of visits to the community’s site offices daily. The comprehensive campaign was rolled out earlier this month across various marketing channels including the radio, print, digital, online and outdoor platforms.

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Dubai Green Buiding's to receive incentives

According to reports from a Dubai government official, the Government is formulating a scheme for providing the green buildings having “green building code” with certain incentives. The plan is expected to be disclosed over the next two months.

“The government is working on an incentive plan for green buildings. Dubai has been on the forefront of introducing green concepts… now the code has gone into printing and will be released in two months”, said Essa Al Mai door, Assistant Director-General for Planning and Engineering, Dubai Municipality.


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Dubai Rental Index Being Revamped

The Land Department of Dubai is working on revamping the rental index, making it more comprehensive. As of Monday, the rent increase calculator on the Real Estate Regulatory Agency’s (Rera) website was not showing the requisite calculations from July 1 onwards with an alert saying, “no rental index available for the selected date”.

The first rent index in Dubai was released in January 2009, complied on the basis of rents during the second half of 2008. Rera says it is not mandatory for landlords to follow the rent index but it is just a guideline or a reference point in case of disputes.

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Qatar World Trade Centre Construction Commences

The development work of Qatar's World Trade Centre tower in Doha has commenced. The work is expected to take at least two years for completion. This was disclosed to the publicon Monday, 28.06.10, during a press conference which was held on the event of signing the agreement between Qatar General Insurance and Reinsurance Company, which owns theproject and the main contractor, the Arabtec Construction Company.

The blueprint of this building showcases latest technology with a very distinct architecture. The Qatar WTC will be a 50-storey tower which will be the abode of 42 levels of offices, a podium of four floors for conferences, four basement car parking and services and a Sphere Structure, housing a multi-purpose auditorium.

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Dubai Real Estate Market Overview

‘Dubai Real Estate Market Overview – Q2 2010: June 2010’ covering the Dubai office, residential, retail and hospitality market segments from Jones Lang LaSalle, the world's leading real estate investment and advisory firm. It reports that tenants have greater opportunities due to increasing availability of space, declining rents, and improved lease terms as the property market begins to bottom out.

Highlights of the overview:

Dubai Real Estate Market Overview
Q2 2010
Market Highlights – Q2 / 2010

• The Dubai office market continues to fragment with a further decoupling between the overall market(which is experiencing increasing vacancies) and good quality buildings in the CBD (where there remainselective shortages). While average city-wide vacancies have increased further (to around 38%), only12% of the 7.5 million sq ft of completed space in single ownership within the CBD is currently vacant.
  

• Retail vacancies have increased to between 8% and 10% as competition intensifies and retailers haveclosed poorer performing stores. This is resulting in a flight to quality and increasing problems (brokentooth phenomenon) in poorer quality centres. The more enlightened centre managers are responding tochanging circumstances by seeking to proactively engage and offer more attractive and flexible terms totheir tenants.
  

• Supply in the residential sector continues to complete, with fewer delays being experienced than in theoffice market. While sales activity has increased and average prices have remained relatively stable,rentals have continued to decline significantly across Q2, particularly in respect of luxury / high end villaand apartment projects.

• The hotel market is the closest to the bottom of the cycle. Increased demand has resulted in a growth ofoccupancies during 2010, but average room rates and RevPAR continue to decline, especially in respectof city hotels.

Dubai Rental Clock – June 2010



















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Dubai is still a key investor’s destination

A report from Moody's Investment Service asks the investors to be optimistic about Dubai and reap out of the lower property costs in the city as it still is one among the most preferred investment choices of investors. According to Faisal Hijazi, Business Development Manager, Rating Services and Islamic Finance at Moody's Dubai, revamping Dubai is not an easy and short process. The investors should keep this in mind and then invest in the city.
"But I think the investors should now take advantage of the available opportunities, which are numerous. Dubai still enjoys a good position in this respect and I think there are good investment opportunities in some sectors," Hijazi said.

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Absconding developers in the eye of law

Absconding developers will soon have to face harsh law for their inability to fulfill their obligations. The Ajman Real Estate Regulatory Agency (Arra) has taken the step to file cases, complaining to the police about some absconding developers. Emirate has now turned to law to make developers pay for their frailty. Soon there will be a spree of arrests made for developers failing their contractual commitment. The motive behind such a step is to resolve disputes through intervention.
Arra chief insists on resolving the problem between developer and the investor by encouraging mutual talks and this is providing ample time for considerations for the developers. The agency also seek to help t he investors who have invested in projects without opting for carefulness when choosing the developer and his project.

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