Real estate salaries jump more than 10%

PAY SCALE: Salaries in the Middle East real estate industry have risen 13 percent in last 12 months. (Getty Images)

Salaries in the Middle East real estate sector have risen more than 13 percent in the last 12 months on the back of booming demand for property in the region, property recruitment firm Macdonald & Co. said on Monday.

Macdonald & Co said in its second annual Middle East Salary Survey that average total monthly remuneration - including extras such as housing and transport allowances - rose by 10.7 percent to 39,181 dirhams ($10,619).

Just over 71 percent of respondents in the region anticipated an increase in economic activity over the next year, compared to just 39 percent in Europe with positive expectations and 31 percent in the UK.

The survey also revealed that the highest average salary in the region was in Qatar, standing at 48,000 dirhams, compared to 32,000 dirhams in 2007. Bahrain came second with the average salary standing at 43,900 dirhams, a decrease from 46,500 dirhams last year.

Abu Dhabi followed with 42,000 dirhams, a bump up from 34,600 dirhams. Dubai came fourth with the average salary reaching 38,500 dirhams, also an increase from 36,000 dirhams. Saudi Arabia followed with other Middle Eastern countries lagging behind.

Salaries also appeared to vary according to region of origin in the survey. Employees from Australasia surfaced as the highest paid employees with salaries averaging 51,200 dirhams, followed by the Americas (increase to 49,200 dirhams), Africa and South Africa (increase to 47,500 dirhams), UK and Europe (decrease to 47,200 dirhams), GCC Nationals (increase to 42,500 dirhams), Middle East non-GCC (slight increase to 32,400 dirhams), ending with Asia and the Far East (moderate increase to 25,900 dirhams).

The survey also found that the Middle East is a region with significant job mobility. It said nearly one in three survey participants have started work in the region in the past two years and fewer than 40 percent have worked here for five years or more.

More than 1,000 real estate professionals in the Middle East participated in the survey online and via questionnaire in late June to early September 2008. 94 percent of participants are employed on a permanent basis (3 percent increase from 2007), with 4 percent consultants (down 2 percent). As last year, 2 percent describe their current role as temporary and 1 percent as unemployed.

"A total of 1,033 property professionals responded to this years' online questionnaire, which is a 21.5 percent increase from last year and an indication on how the market values the results of the survey," Matthew Taylor, international director of Macdonald & Co, said in a statement.

Despite a slight dip in confidence, property professionals in the Middle East overall remain very positive about the prospects for their particular area of activity, according to the survey.

Just under three-quarters of those who responded to the survey (71 percent, down 5 percent since 2007) anticipate that the economic activity in their chosen professional activity will increase over the next 12 months. Another 26 percent expect that it will remain the same. Only 4 percent anticipate a decrease.

Property professionals in the Middle East also remain more likely to move jobs than those in other regions surveyed. When asked ‘How likely are you to change employers within the next 12 months?’, 58 percent in the Middle East said that they were very/fairly likely to make a change, compared, for example, with 39% in the recent continental European survey.

Over one quarter (27 percent) suggest that they are ‘very likely’ to change their employer in the next twelve months, up 4 percent since 2007. Little more than one in ten suggested that they are ‘not at all likely’.

As for satisfaction with salary, the majority of respondent property professionals in the Middle East are at least ‘fairly’ satisfied with their salary. One in five are ‘very’ satisfied. Nevertheless, 21 percent remain less pleased (‘not very’ or ‘not at all’ satisfied).

Job satisfaction for property professionals continues to be high with their present jobs: 79 percent are at least ‘fairly satisfied’ (no change since 2007). However, in 2007 only one in five (20 percent) were ‘very satisfied’ and over the last year this figure has dropped, by almost half, to 11 percent.

This leaves 21 percent who are ‘not very’ or ‘not at all’ satisfied.

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Faking it
Posted by Graham Plater, Munich, Germany on Monday 6 October 2008 at 17:29 UAE time


By rights the real estate salaries in question should be paid in Monopoly banknotes. Hats off to an industry selling fake investments in a fake paradise to fake investors and fake residents. Need proof? Take a drive around places like Dubai Marina at night and count the number of lights on. Then allow for a few Security guys watching TV, and reach your own conclusions about how many people actually live (or will ever live) in these vertical ghost towns. If just 50% of owners ever did, the place would simply choke itself to death in the traffic. Of course, by building bedrooms by the million and then claiming that "the population of Dubai will have increased to xx million by the year 20xx" you can then find reasons for building mega-airports etc. etc. to massage the local ego. Just to be safe, at the same time local money is being pumped abroad at high speed and into more, er, solid investments. But now that foreign investors are getting their fingers burnt at home and therefore becoming a bit more cautious, it might be a little late to question the wisdom of “building on sand” ad nauseam. So, dear real-estate high earners, put some away for a rainy day…

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