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Dubai real estate business if one of the leading among the world’s real estate businesses. Comparitively one thrid of the cranes that are used throughout the world for construction are employed at Dubai for construction of buildings. One can choose among the different real estate businesses with many different features for each. The city has all that requirements anyone would require, that range from commercial properties to residential properties. There is a saying tells that most of the expensive apartments in Dubai are bought by foreigners , right ?

yuqtegsdfr , Wrong! This used to be true, now the property market has died a death, investors are stuck, many projects have been cancelled. Investors were made promises and lied to with regards to residence visas etc Construction on many projects is well below standard.

I love my little flat in JBR. I'm really pleased I bought it, I've not had one regret.

It was ok till 2006, after that property market went into a bubble. Right now there are too many projects that are not healthy for Dubai. Sports city is a mess, Dubai Land is also a mess, waterfront is in good location but the whole development is dead. The communties that were build during the early boom will be ok: Marina, JBR, Downtown, and Palm Jumeirah. Business bay should be ok, it has a good concept.

I'm worried about Dubai Sports City and Dubai Land, they are way far off the original concept. There are few appartment buildings that will be completed there but not much is there. Who will live there? Unless people are looking for cheap rents, nobody would want to live there. Govt should cancel all these extra realestate projects return what can be returned back to investors, or some of these developments will bring down dubai. International city already feels like a slump, Dubai Sport City feels it may become much worse with the current situation. But original concept of both Dubai Sport City and Dubai Land was a good one, but during the bubble it went off track.

Nucleus , I'm so ticked off with that. I have an apartment in DSS, it was meant to be finished in 2008 - I'm still waiting! We've been offered no compensation, no reduction in price to today's market value, no move into completed projects and guess what? We can't get out of our contracts either. As investors we are screwed big time.

Nucleus wrote:International city already feels like a slump

Did you mean slum?? If so, you are correct.

Bora Bora wrote:Did you mean slum?? If so, you are correct.

Yup, my bad.

Choc, I'm in the same situation. Trying to get out. Seems like your developer is way passed the delivery date, you can file a case in court it seems like it has good chances of winning. What is the current construction status?

Take a look at this: http://www.arabianbusiness.com/buyer-wo ... 38713.html

That's all very well if your developer has any money left. Most developers are bankrupt and you have absolutely no chance of getting blood out of a stone.

You may well win a case in the court but collecting is another matter. Unless you can see some work under way, I would kiss your money, goodbye. If they had the money to build, they would.

Time for a reality check folks.

professorgreen wrote:That's all very well if your developer has any money left. Most developers are bankrupt and you have absolutely no chance of getting blood out of a stone.

You may well win a case in the court but collecting is another matter. Unless you can see some work under way, I would kiss your money, goodbye. If they had the money to build, they would.

Time for a reality check folks.

Depends on the cost vs benefits. Good lawyer who has min. fixed fee and rest is dependent on what is recovered is better. Not much to lose except fixed fee and court expenses. And lawyer money is dependent on the recovered money, they will chase the developer themselves. If it is a good investment then it is worth to wait.

Depends on number of factors which will be different case to case.

Nucleus wrote:Depends on the cost vs benefits. Good lawyer who has min. fixed fee and rest is dependent on what is recovered is better. Not much to lose except fixed fee and court expenses. And lawyer money is dependent on the recovered money, they will chase the developer themselves. If it is a good investment then it is worth to wait.

Depends on number of factors which will be different case to case.

If the project has stalled, then it is most likely that it is because there is no money to finish it. If there was, then the developer would finish it.
Your lawyer can be wonderful but if there is no money, then you will not recover any money. It's called throwing good money after bad.

There was a recent article on CNN when the top dog in Dubai said that the bottom had fallen out of the property market in Dubai as foreign investors failed to pay their instalments. That article is now unavailable on CNN.

Save your Court fee and fixed expenses. But I wish you good luck, you will need it.

PS how does it feel to be ripped off in an Islamic state?

professorgreen wrote:If the project has stalled, then it is most likely that it is because there is no money to finish it. If there was, then the developer would finish it.

Not necessarily. Lawyer knows this too, they know how to squeez the money out. Worst case, developer will do a runner and they will seize the assets. If they can't get anything out still that is legally better. If developer is slowly building they will reach 60% and try to forfeit all of the money without any compensation on late delivery. If court rules against them you have a better chance to renegotiate. But that depends from case to case.

professorgreen wrote:Save your Court fee and fixed expenses. But I wish you good luck, you will need it.

Our group of investors had already won 1 case in Abu Dhabi, and developer is returning the money in installments. And for any late payment they incur 8% interest on accured amount.

Another case we are persuing in Dubai. Good chances of recovering at least 50% there.

professorgreen wrote:PS how does it feel to be ripped off in an Islamic state?

huh? What this has to do with Islamic state? I know people who invested in spain and they are in same situation if not worse. Developer did a runner and all they have is building with some foundations.

Nucleus wrote:huh? What this has to do with Islamic state? I know people who invested in spain and they are in same situation if not worse. Developer did a runner and all they have is building with some foundations.

I thought Muslims were supposed to be honest? The property market in Dubai just goes to prove you can't trust anyone.
At the end of the day Muslims are no more honest that D1ck Turpin, but he wore a mask.

Other faith also ask to be honest. But it has nothing to do with honesty, market bubbles happen in big booms, it happened in industrial boom before great depression, it happened in Japan with their property boom, it happened with .com boom. Boom and busts are part of economic cycles.

Nucleus wrote:

professorgreen wrote:If the project has stalled, then it is most likely that it is because there is no money to finish it. If there was, then the developer would finish it.

Not necessarily. Lawyer knows this too, they know how to squeez the money out. Worst case, developer will do a runner and they will seize the assets. If they can't get anything out still that is legally better. If developer is slowly building they will reach 60% and try to forfeit all of the money without any compensation on late delivery. If court rules against them you have a better chance to renegotiate. But that depends from case to case.

professorgreen wrote:Save your Court fee and fixed expenses. But I wish you good luck, you will need it.

Our group of investors had already won 1 case in Abu Dhabi, and developer is returning the money in installments. And for any late payment they incur 8% interest on accured amount.

Another case we are persuing in Dubai. Good chances of recovering at least 50% there.

professorgreen wrote:PS how does it feel to be ripped off in an Islamic state?

huh? What this has to do with Islamic state? I know people who invested in spain and they are in same situation if not worse. Developer did a runner and all they have is building with some foundations.

Rephrase please. The lawyer knows how to squish the money out of you. There are no liquidation law or solvency solutions in this country. The only solution is if he is still in the UAE then he goes to jail based on the security issued.

If the funds and developer are already out the country will your lawyer deal with the specific country law that does not have any reciprocal agree ment with the UAE? ....".............No!

--- Fri Jan 13, 2012 10:06 pm ---

professorgreen wrote:

Nucleus wrote:huh? What this has to do with Islamic state? I know people who invested in spain and they are in same situation if not worse. Developer did a runner and all they have is building with some foundations.

I thought Muslims were supposed to be honest? The property market in Dubai just goes to prove you can't trust anyone.
At the end of the day Muslims are no more honest that D1ck Turpin, but he wore a mask.

Agreed.

You edited my quote, it is not the proper way to quote. That may or may not be agaist the forum rules.

As for going going for lawyer, well my investors group has recovered significant amount of money that way which was not possible directly negotiating with the developer. But like I said, it will differ from case to case.

--- Fri Jan 13, 2012 11:51 pm ---

One more thing, if you don't like muslims and muslim state then why you are living here?

It has nothing to do with religion! What a daft thing to say. Half the developers were/are from other countries, how many of them ripped people off, took investors money and did runners? Plenty!

Nucleus, it's very very difficult to bring cases here. The legal systsme won't touch certain banks or developers as it's too political and the chances of winning are virtually zerp. Most cases have to go through arbitration which can take at least 9 months and costs a small fortune even to bring a case, so for most people it's just not worth the effort.

Chocoholic ,

If arnie were still here he'd be saying "I told you so chocs".

Everything at Sports City (and Motor Coty for that matter) has been at a standstill for a few years now, which is shame because they both showed a lot of promise.

The 2 worst decisions I have ever seen are putting the sevens stadium half way to Al Ain and Fazza'a aquatic centre in the middle of nowhere instead of both at sports city. These stupid decisions make my blood boil!

On the bright side, there seems to be some movement recently and there was a rumour that they got told to finish it, so you might just get your apartment one day.

Bethsmum ,



Banned again?

benwj wrote:Everything at Sports City (and Motor Coty for that matter) has been at a standstill for a few years now, which is shame because they both showed a lot of promise.

The 2 worst decisions I have ever seen are putting the sevens stadium half way to Al Ain and Fazza'a aquatic centre in the middle of nowhere instead of both at sports city. These stupid decisions make my blood boil!

Seems like planners are not centeralized. If these two were in Sports City, it would have brought life to the place. Or they thought it will take too much time for residential buildings to complete and look bad, so they wanted to make them in separate area. They need to cancel/consolidate the projects, the way it is spread out it is neither good for the investors or Sport City. And build anything new sports related in Sports City. They even use the name Haiba Fourith or something. Why can't they just call it Sports City. Concept of Sports City is good, but it needs replanning.

Nucleus , Yup good idea.
benwj , LOL oh he did say 'I told you so'. We'll see. As far as I'm concered the longer it takes to finish the better at this rate.

Chocoholic , The longer it takes to finish the better? How do you work that out? Surely you are making your staged payments and paying rent at the same time? Maybe I'm missing something? To me, I would say all your rent is wasted money with no return. If your apartment had been ready on time, or soon after, you wouldn't be paying rent. You'll never get that back and would have to factor it in when calculating what profit you make.

I would venture the opinion that you are quids out. Especially if you bought at the height of property prices. Anyone who bought after 2007 missed the boat.

professorgreen , no actually, all the mortgages are on hold, which means on handover you have to pay all the accrued interest in one lump sum payment! So obviously trying to save for that as well as currently paying rent. So the longer it takes the better, also the longer it takes, the more stablished the area becomes and so in turn rental prices go up. At the moment, the rental prices investors would currently get wouldn't even cover the monthly mortgage payments.

I did pay less than alot of people.

If the apartment were handed over today, the full mortgage + service fees would be higher than the current rent she is paying + part-mortgage. She would be losing money from month to month.

Rents won't be increasing for the forseeable future, so waiting is not such a bad position to be in.

Although I would still be trying to pay off the part-mortgage asap.

It is frustrating, but you're right, it could be a lot worse.

When Ever I came across, I'd like I got best and reliable real estate agent in Dubai IFAProperties

When we invested in Dubai in 2005 we thought that our investment was relatively safe.
There was a developer, Wind FZ - LLC and a master developer, Dubai government-owned master developer Nakheel. I naively thought that should there be a problem in the developer completing the project, the master developer, Dubai government-owned master developer Nakheel would step in and save the day.

I was wrong.

From 2005 until 2008 all the payments were made directly to the developer, Mahmoud Reza Azizi Torshizi. Then in 2008 the Dubai Government setup an escrow account for investors to put their payments into. Not sure how much investor money made it into the escrow account but soon after the 2008 Global Financial Crisis the developer, Mahmoud Reza Azizi Torshizi allegedly skipped town with the all investor’s funds. He left lots of unpaid creditors too.

Was Azizi arrested and thrown in jail? Heck no. Did the Dubai government turn a blink eye into his crimes. Heck yes. They haven’t so much as started any legal action against him. More than that they are still letting hm conduct business in Dubai.

It appears that in Dubai that there are 2 sets of rules. One that applies to all the serfs (thats you and I) and another that applies to the wealthy.

My advise for anyone thinking of investing in Dubai is this. Do some research on the country you are thinking of investing in:

There are a lot of factors to consider such as the type of government that is in place, how secure the real estate rights you have in that country are, and how easy it is to have your property rights taken away from you.

Send your money to a place with good economic freedom.

Also Google Dark side of Dubai for more about Dubai.

Dubai-Investor

very good discussion is going on here.

Dubai property market has seen a massive change from the downturn of 2008 - especially with the developers running away with investors money etc...

most developers flocked back to there original countries and wernt ever to be seen or heard of.

the unfortunate circumstances that have happened above have effected many investors over the finacial crisis term but this has not turn people away.

new rules regulations and laws have been put in place for investors and also developers its not as easy for developers to abscond anymore.

yes its a wise idea to do your research before you put any money down but this can happen in any country, take for example spain many brits invested in spanish properties that didnt belong to the developers or they didnt have planning consent it can happen any where, a developer in Britain ceased trading after taking peoples money did the British government do anything... NOTHING... he has declared bankruptcy...

theres a lot going on in Dubai be wise and you can earn or land in a gold mine new developments etc.. i believe that Dubai is a good place to invest, i have personnaly been hit by a certain developer but then have made through others..