Register your property value with Dubai Municipality otherwise DEWA would charge on RERA's estimates

Only one in six homes in the emirate has registered their property values with Dubai Municipality, meaning their housing fees are calculated by their true values, rather than estimates by the Real Estate Regulatory Authority (Rera).

The housing fee, 5 per cent of a tenant's annual rent or 5 per cent of the freehold property value, has been listed on Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (Dewa) bills since 2005.

The fee brings in about Dh45 million a month and is given to the Dubai Ruler's financial office for redistribution to public service projects.

Mr Ali, from India, said he was registered and only became aware of the error when signing a new Dewa contract on Tuesday. "I didn't realise there was a mistake until Dewa informed me," he said. "I assumed their calculations were correct."

After visiting the new municipality housing fee office at Al Twar Centre yesterday, Mr Ali was promised a refund.

"I was told the deduction would show on my new bill," he said. "The new centre was excellent. The employee was very helpful."

Since opening last month, Al Twar Centre has handled more than 1,500 housing fee complaints, said Khalid Al Mulla, the head of the general revenues section at Dubai Municipality. A second office was opened in Al Manara Centre on Sheikh Zayed Road at the same time.

Despite the law, numerous warnings and awareness campaigns, Mr Al Mulla said records showed only 53,000 of about 300,000 units were registered on the municipality website.

To register a property, residents should log on to https://portal.dm.gov.ae/rcapp/register.jsp and answer a series of questions, including name, rent or sale amount, address and Dewa account number.

The amount registered should match the amount on the lease or sales agreement that was filed with Dewa during connection.

Abdulla Hashim, the head of the housing fee unit, said customers should study their bills carefully. If the property price decreased, information should be updated so adjustments were made. Those who have not registered their property values will not be eligible for refunds.

"It's a very simple online process," Mr Hashim said. "Once residents upload details they will be billed correctly. Most of the queries we receive are from those who are unregistered but we will not send them backdated bills."

Mr Hashim said too many residents chose to wait and see whether the Rera estimate was less than their lease.

The department is now working with Dewa to ensure all Dubai units are covered. Another awareness campaign will be launched within two months and billing by default will be delayed until things settle.

"Dewa has account details of those not being billed so we will issue notices and instructions," said Mr Hashim.

© The National

Tenants can wide chioce in Dubai due low rent with newly build apartments and Villas

Prices in Dubai’s Discovery Gardens plunged 10 percent in the third quarter as developer Nakheel released new units to the market at rents that undercut owners, said Asteco. 

Landlords in the development cut their losses after failing to attract tenants at rates to cover their mortgage payments, the real estate consultancy said in a report.

“Nakheel released a significant number of units at reduced rental rates, which, coupled with the high service charges, forced some owners to sell at a reduced price,” said Elaine Jones, CEO.

Nakheel, the developer of Dubai’s Discovery Gardens and International City, said in May it would give tenants up to two months rent-free in units in the lower-priced developments, as it moved to release new units on to the market.

The state-owned company said last month it would hand over up to 1,663 units by the year-end in International City, where studio rents have already fallen to around AED15,000 a year.

Analysts have warned Dubai risks developing a two-tiered property market with villas and apartments in poorly maintained developments proving difficult to rent out or sell.

In a research note this week, property consultancy Cluttons said units in poor locations, with limited access to amenities and poor finishes would see ongoing declines in value.

“[Such properties] are falling further in demand and this ultimately reflects in lower values,” the report said. “The supply-demand gap is still apparent in less desirable locations and unfortunately this will be around for some time.”

The emirate-wide decline in rents has increasingly allowed tenants to upgrade to prime developments with little impact on their pockets, said Matthew Green, head of research at CB Richard Ellis in Dubai.

“The addition of new supply across the market allows occupiers to upscale and move to newer and better specification units at lease end, often for no additional rental cost,” he said.

Some 5,000 new homes are expected to hit Dubai's market by year-end, property consultancy Jones Lang LaSalle said in a recent report, with a further 27,000 seen in 2012, taking total stock across Dubai to around 358,000 homes.

Prices for properties in sought-after locations such as Palm Jumeirah and Dubai International Financial Centre fared better in the third quarter, Asteco said, with units largely holding their value.

Sales prices and rents for villas declined 1 and 4 percent respectively, largely in response to the summer lull and Ramadan, said Jones.

“This is the third consecutive quarter that quality buildings in established locations have experienced steady sales prices and rental rates” she said.

Property prices in Dubai soared after the city opened its real estate sector to foreign investors in 2002, granting them freehold ownership rights at many developments.

From start-2007 to mid-2008, prices rallied almost 80 percent, Morgan Stanley estimates showed, with billions of dollars worth of new projects launched by local developers.

But home prices in Dubai, the Gulf property market that had the biggest reversal because of the financial crisis, fell more than 60 percent in the wake of the global credit crunch.

Jones Lang LaSalle said in September the emirate had shown small signs of recovery with house prices rising in certain areas and the number of transactions rising.

The Gulf emirate has also benefited from being seen as a safe haven amid the Arab Spring, toppling leaders in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya, the consultancy said.


© Arabian Business

Europe eyes on Investment from Gulf States

As Europe’s banking system has weakened over the last several months, financial markets have been abuzz with rumours and media reports about possible investments from the Gulf — particularly from cash-rich Qatar, which has been on an international acquisitions spree.

Analysts and bankers said it was possible that Qatar would make relatively small investments, perhaps of several hundred million euros, in European financial firms. Some European media reports last week said Qatar was part of an international consortium discussing a purchase of Dexia’s Luxembourg arm, valued at some 900 million euros ($1.2 billion).

But analysts said Qatar and other Gulf states were unlikely to invest aggressively enough to make much difference to big European financial institutions.

“Not even Qatar’s pockets are deep enough to really throw meaningful capital at the European financial system. They could participate in some of the capital raising that banks are doing, but ultimately, public multilateral support is needed,” said Rachel Ziemba, director at Roubini Global Economics in London.

Other Gulf states may be even more cautious, analysts said. The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority has some $600 billion of assets, but Abu Dhabi was required to bail out Dubai during a property market crash two years ago and if the global economy worsens, it may yet need to provide more support.

And Abu Dhabi has been burned in the past. In 2007 it agreed to a $7.5 billion investment in Citigroup Inc but filed an arbitration claim at the end of 2009 accusing the US bank of misrepresentation, after its stock price plunged. Citigroup said it had not acted improperly.

Saudi Arabia also has a huge financial war chest, but its government embarked this year on a $130 billion spending programme on housing and other projects. With global oil prices approaching levels at which its budget surplus could disappear, it may not want to undertake risky new investments abroad.

The financial market speculation about Qatar’s intentions resembles that over China. Rumours have abounded this year that Beijing will deploy more of its $3.2 trillion in foreign exchange reserves to buy the government debt of Greece and other weak European countries.

But so far, Chinese buying has not prevented a collapse of the bond prices of indebted European states. There is no evidence that China is buying more euro zone bonds than the weighting of the euro in its reserves would indicate, and many of the bonds it does hold are believed to be German and other top-quality credits, not the debt of weak countries.