Property in Dubai Buyer's Guides

There has been a flurry of media excitement this last week focused on the property market in Dubai now that Tamweel, Dubai’s second biggest Islamic mortgage company by assets, won the right to repossess five homes in the emirate.  Headlines have suggested that Dubai will become the next foreclosure hotspot where investors and speculator will be able to buy bargains.

However, talking up the repossession property market in Dubai is very unwise for many reasons which we will explore in this report.  For a start, any repossessed homes will be a long time coming back to the market – what’s more, speculators and investors got Dubai into the mess it’s in, therefore you can guarantee that the powers that be will not want to welcome them back by offering them a veritable flood of repossessed homes for sale at bargain prices.

If you’re looking for a more realistic take on the property market in Dubai now that homes are finally being repossessed when buyers default on mortgage payments, you will find it here.  Any fantasies you harbour for picking up an offshore island in Dubai for a rock bottom price may be damned however!

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In case you weren’t in Dubai last month and you missed Emaar Properties’ announcement that their ‘obelisk’ Burj Khalifa, (the tallest building in the world), has reached completion, we thought we’d tell you all about the party that they threw in celebration!  But is Dubai back from the brink with the launch of this tower?  Well, one thing is certain, Dubai certainly isn’t going down without a fight!

The completion of the main structure of Burj Khalifa was made public amidst revelling crowds and majestic displays of lasers, fireworks and fountains – as we have all come to expect in Dubai!  And the final certified height of the building – which had been withheld until the day of the ceremony – was declared to be 828 metres, (2,716.5 feet).  This figure was flashed on to a huge screen projected to an awaiting crowd of about 400,000 people; and the secretive height was revealed in arithmetic progression as the pyrotechnic display left the crowd in awe.  Pretty spectacular stuff!

So, we can now officially state that tower is the world’s tallest structure, a claim that is backed up by the CTBUH – the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat.  And Emaar Properties certainly threw one almighty party in celebration.  But does this change the property market’s landscape in the emirate, or was it just one almighty smokescreen to deflect attention from the continued economic downturn in Dubai?

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Finally a little truth is beginning to emerge from the emirate of Dubai after years of a cover up that involved everyone constantly being told that the emirate’s economy was unstoppable, that the only way was up for this state and that Dubai would weather any financial storm and come out on top, as one of the most successful and affluent locations in the world.

The bubble that was Dubai’s success has spectacularly been popped – it actually burst of its own accord about 2 or so years ago, but since then there has been an almighty cover up, the likes of which we have never seen before – oh, apart from when it came to WMDs, Tony Blair and the Iraq War of course, allegedly.

So, Dubai is drowning in debt, they have asked for a suspension of repayments, senior figures in the leading construction companies have been sacked and everything seems to be grinding to a halt on the high profile property developments such as the Dubai World project and the Burj Dubai, which is supposed to be the world’s tallest manmade structure.  What’s more, an emergency debt restructuring team from Deloitte have been called in and we’re quite certain that Dubai’s property prices are likely to plunge even further.  So, does this herald the end of the Dubai dream…

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