Hello from a UK expat now living in Oz but having a property built in Dubai

[Andrew Williams]

Hi there

I was browsing the Australian expat forum as I moved to Oz from the UK about a year and a half ago and noticed this Dubai forum. Thought I would say hello, I am actually having an apartment built in International City.

How's life in Dubai, has the GFC (Global Financial Crisis) taken much of a toll over there? I understand a fair bit of building has ceased, is this true or media hype?

How is the economy stacking up. Australia and certainly Adelaide where I live now have done relatively well. I am in Financial Services, I worked in the UK for Alliance & Leicester for a number of years and prior to the move Natwest as a Financial Planner for 4 years. It seems that I got out at the right time, Nov 07.

I have been a Financial Adviser here in Oz since Feb 08 and have recently started set up my own practice due to the workload. I have had great support from UK expats and Adelaide seems to be a popular choice at the moment for UK expats.

Australia is extremely geared up to creating wealth and it is vey common for people here to have investment properties and hold shares. The pension/superannuation system is much more sophisticated than the UK and it is compulsory for employers to pay 9% of employees salary in there superannuation fund. Great move.

How is it set up n Dubai?

I would be very interested to hear about these things, boring to most I know.

Anyway, bye for now.

Regards

Andy

[Andrew Williams]

No takers, oh well.

Maybe someone can answer these questions for me.

What would be the going rent for a studio apartment at the moment. Our's is being built in International City. We bought it for 50kGBP, so not sure what the value of it would be now.

The Builders have offered a net return of 7% per annum, so 290GBP a month, how does this compare?

Also what have prices done out there? We put our deposit down in August 07 so not sure what the likely value would be now. Also it was meant to be furnished but we were told that it will rent out easier if it is unfurnished, is this true?

Cheers guys in advance.


Andy

[mayotom]

Hi Andrew

to the Dubai Forum.

Dubai has been hit very hard by the GFC but the worst seems to be over now

Just some of the numbers that have been around in the press recently:

Property down 50% since September
Property to go down another 20-40% by year end
Property to go up 10-20% by year end(same paper different day)
Rents down similar to above
Dubai population to Drop 17%

Re your Studio in international City, current asking prices are a bit over AED 300k however there is the odd one selling for less than AED250k

monthly rent for a studio is now as low as 3000 but you may be lucky and get 4000. the old system of paying one year up front is now non existent in Int City the best you can hope for is 3-4 cheques. There is a market now for Furnished apartments there on shorter term rents(2-3 months) because many people do not want to commit to a year due to job uncertainty. oh and the final nail, there are thousands of apartments empty in Int city and all over dubai.

on a brighter note Int city has now become much cheaper than the likes of Sharjah and Ajman, this has caused a lot of families to move from those area's so there is good rental opportunities if the price is right

another factor to consider for you 7% net yield is that the maintenance charges there are astronomical, has this been accounted for

so all of the above is probably why you have not had any responses. we don't like to be the bearers of bad news


hope this helps