Surveying success

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Alex Upson, partner for international sales, Cluttons.

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Restored Casali Farmhouse at Castello Di Casole, Italy.

Property consultants Cluttons has had a strong presence in the middle east for over 30 years. Alex Upson, partner in international sales shares his views on investment and the property bubble.

What does Cluttons do?

Cluttons is a firm of chartered surveyors and property consultants, established over 200 years ago. The company has been in the Middle East for over 30 years.

The core business is valuations and management, but the office in Dubai also takes care of sales and lettings for residential and commercial properties. Valuations, property management and feasibility studies are carried out by qualified surveyors.

We are part of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) and our valuations and reports follow those guidelines. Roughly 10% of our business is estate agency.

What is your role in the company?

I am Partner for International Sales, based in London. I look after property sales from the international market to the UK market. Anyone in the UK who wants to buy a second home abroad in a place like Dubai will come to us, as we focus on the Gulf.

We know the ground pretty well, so we can advise people on where they should buy and what they should look out for.

We also have offices in South Africa, Italy and Barbados, and an associate office in Moscow. These are stand-alone operations, but when they need help from the UK that's where I come in.

They operate within their own communities; our Italian office sells local properties mainly to English people moving to Italy. We get involved if there is away in which we can help, by introducing them to people wanting to buy in that part of the world. I help these offices on a reactionary basis, but really my role is centred around the Gulf.

How do you advise your customers?

A first-time buyer may not know that in Dubai there are some zones where you can own as a foreigner and some that you can't. In that case, our advice would start off being very basic.

We would ask them whether they're looking for an apartment or a villa and what the purpose of the purchase is. It could be a young couple moving to Dubai for work, with two children, who want to be near a school and near the workplace.

We'll try and advise them on the best places to go, which could be Arabian Ranches, or depending on their budget, the Greens. When they've decided what they want to buy, we will hold their hand through the process.

For people who live in the region it's very easy, because they've done it before. Somebody moving out from the UK may have no idea about the property market.

We'll take them through the whole buying process by making sure their deposit is in, getting the paperwork in order and helping them with finance by introducing them to lenders.

Alternatively, if someone is looking at buying to let with a budget of US$200,000, and they want to buy in the Burj Dubai, we will tell them they won't be able to afford it but we can recommend other options.

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