Posted inReal Estate

Dubai developer says real estate market is ‘as low as it’s going to get’

Madhav Dhar, co-founder and COO of ZaZEN Properties, said emirate’s villa market is ‘booming’

ZāZEN Properties, which was co-founded by Dhar in 2018, is currently close to 50 percent through the construction of its maiden project, ZāZEN One in Jumeirah Village Triangle.

ZāZEN Properties, which was co-founded by Dhar in 2018, is currently close to 50 percent through the construction of its maiden project, ZāZEN One in Jumeirah Village Triangle.

A Dubai-based developer has claimed the emirate’s real estate market “is as low as it’s going to get”.

But while Madhav Dhar, co-founder and COO of ZāZEN Properties, told Arabian Business that the city’s sector is currently ripe for investment, he said that only applied to certain asset classes, with the increased demand post-Covid pushing up the prices of villa properties.

According to the latest findings from real estate consultants Valustrat’s index, all villa locations in Dubai saw their capital values improve and most apartment locations stabilised in May.

Seven out 10 villa locations monitored by the VPI saw annual improvements averaging between 1.1 to 5.4 percent. Average residential property prices in Dubai have increased by up to 5.4 percent so far in 2021 following further growth in May, according to the research.

Dhar said: “If you had asked me in the middle of last year, has the market bottomed out, I would have said to give it until the end of 2020 and I believe that it would have bottomed out at that time. But then September and October, the transactions went crazy and we ended last year only about eight or nine percent down from the previous year. Considering Covid and considering the impact, I think that was tremendous.

“The market is as low as it’s going to get. I believe so. But you look at real estate as a long-term investment. Yes it’s a great time to get in now, but is it the right time to get into villas now? I would say no because since September last year the villa market has been booming.”

ZāZEN Properties, which was co-founded by Dhar in 2018, is currently close to 50 percent through the construction of its maiden project, ZāZEN One in Jumeirah Village Triangle. Despite work halting completely for six-months during the height of the pandemic last year, the development, which consists of 86 residences or one, two and three-bedroom duplex apartments, is scheduled to complete at the end of this year, with handover slated for January 2022.

Located just off Al Khail Road, the project is billed as “contemporary community living”, essentially catering for the mid-market segment in Dubai, where Dhar believed there is currently a gap in the market.

Madhav Dhar, co-founder and COO of ZāZEN Properties

He said: “Dubai has been positioned in the global market as five-star or seven-star, but I think the government has made the right move over the last five years or so to make it a more family-friendly destination.

“What that brought along with it was more people who didn’t have the pockets for the five- or seven-star places. They were happy with good quality places and we felt that was being underserved.

“It’s a great opportunity. The mid-market segment according to us is a manager who has just got a job in Dubai, a newly married couple, a couple with one child, who are looking for a community that has already been developed, which has some schools in the community, which has a mall nearby and has parks and playgrounds.”

Sharjah-born Dhar has previously worked for developers including Damac Properties and The First Group. He revealed further plans for more projects in Dubai, including a “few plots” in the Discovery Gardens/Al Furjan area of the emirate.

“We are looking to develop this next, but we will only do it one at a time. We don’t want to extend ourselves or put any of our buyers at risk,” he said.

“I look at Dubai as a long-term market. I’m not a developer who is here to make a quick buck and run.”

Follow us on

For all the latest business news from the UAE and Gulf countries, follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn, like us on Facebook and subscribe to our YouTube page, which is updated daily.