If you have a question or want a general overview of the results from the property survey, you’ve come to the right place. Read on below...

How was the survey done?

This survey was marketed only to ArabianBusiness.com readers and subscribers of its newsletters.

The newsletter is sent to over 120,000 readers every day, while the site attracts more than 600,000 visitors each month.

In total 3004 surveys were completed. Answers came from respondents came from 104 nationalities, who were asked 27 questions about their property and their attitudes towards the real estate market.

What is the general consensus on prices in the market right now?

The overwhelming majority of you believe real estate within the GCC is overpriced, according to the survey.

Data revealed almost half of you (45.31%) believe property prices are far too expensive, while a further 42.78% said prices are moderately overpriced.

Only 10% of survey participants feel prices are fair and only 1.83% believed prices are low, the survey found.

Qatar appeared to be the most overpriced market in the region, with 52% of you believing real estate there is “far too expensive.”

Bahrain was perceived to be the least overpriced, although 43.2% of you still said prices were far too high.

How does build quality stack up against international standards?

Only one in 46 of you (2.17%) think that the build quality of GCC real estate is above international standards. The remainder were split between either below average (48.18%) or equal to international standards (49.65%).

Perhaps as a result of these perceptions, the survey revealed decidedly low customer loyalty for Gulf developers, with more than half of you who have purchased property in the GCC (50.54%) stating you do not favour any particular property development group.

The surprising findings appear to raise questions about overall customer satisfaction with services offered by GCC developers, and the quality levels of properties purchased.

Those of you who did state a developer preference preferred Emaar Properties. The Dubai-based company garnered around a quarter (24.51%) of the vote from those who indicated loyalty to one company. Nakheel was second, receiving 8.28% of your votes.

Of the six GCC markets, which do you favour to offer the best return on investment over the next two years?

The overwhelming majority of you voted for the UAE as the place to invest. The results, however, were tempered by the fact that the majority of GCC participants in the survey were from the Emirates.

To offer a more balanced view, we broke the data down by GCC country. Although most of you voted your own nation as the best positioned to deliver returns on investment – both in terms of rental yield and capital gains - the UAE was by far and away the most popular second choice.

Foreign investors from 96 other countries around the world shared similar feelings with, three quarters (72.37%) of you voting for the UAE as the Gulf real estate market to get into.

A long way back in second place was the gas-rich state of Qatar, scoring 10.74% of your votes.

Do owners feel the time is right to buy another property?

The outlook seems to be pretty positive on this front with around four in five of you (79.55%) looking to buy your second, third or fourth property.

Nearly three-quarters (73.89%) of you who own just one property said you plan on buying additional real estate, mostly as a means of investment.

That figure jumped to 83% for those of you with two properties and nine out of ten of you who own five properties or more said you plan on adding more to your portfolio.

Those of you who feel the time is not right to get back into the market cited cost and fears of a correction as the primary deterrents.

Why do people choose to get into the GCC real estate market?

We found that more of you are motivated by investment potential when purchasing real estate than by any other single reason.

Almost half (45.74%) of you cited investment as your primary reason for purchasing property, the data indicated, compared to only one in 151 who bought their dream “holiday home” here in the Gulf.

Most of you who were after that ideal getaway residence, however, chose Kuwait with 14.29% saying that was their primary reason for buying in the oil-rich Gulf state.

What kind of property to people generally go for here?

In a word: apartments. The city living of metropolises like Doha and Dubai generally cater for this type of lifestyle.

Data also revealed that most of you still prefer to splash out on larger homes despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of you see prices as overvalued.

Those of you investing in the Saudi real estate market, for example, are most likely to go for three- and four-bedroom houses, despite 80% of you believing real estate prices are too high.

The situation in Egypt is similar, with only one in five going for a more modest one-bedroom dwelling while four in five of you think the market is too expensive.

Do most people take out a mortgage to buy their property?

Only around one in five of you (21.9%) will not use a mortgage to purchase your GCC property, the study found.

Broken down by country, Qatar and the UAE were the most leveraged markets. In Qatar, 69.23% of people who had purchased property borrowed 71% or more of the purchase price with 15.38% took out a mortgage of over 90%.

And your wage didn’t appear to effect how much of your purchase value you will borrow either.

Those of you in the middle income brackets of between $2,000 and $5,000 per month and middle income of $5,001 and $10,000 per month were found to have taken out the largest mortgages on average.

Those of you who make below $1,000 (the lowest wage bracket offered by the survey) were the most likely to have built up capital as a deposit and to have taken out the smallest mortgages as a percentage of their property’s value. Given that banks and finance companies often lend on multiples of salary this makes sense.

Are many people buying off plan?

Flatly: Yes. And a big yes, too.

Data from the survey indicated that 75.49% of you intend to purchase off-plan directly from the developer, while a further 10.89% will buy off-plan on the secondary market.

That leaves only 13.62% of you who plan to buy a property that has already been built.

There’s some interesting comments about this from experts we interviewed to help us draw some conclusions from the study. Be sure to check that out while you are browsing the pages.

There are also links to individual stories and plenty of graphs you can use to give you a better visual perspective of your property market. Simply click on the navigation bar above to get started.