Dubai’s luxury home sales outperform market in 2015

Sales almost double, with Dubai Marina emerging as top area

dubai — The prime residential market in Dubai beat the overall residential market by nearly doubling the volume of sales from Q4 in 2015. This quarter, the prime residential market completed Dh3.2 billion in sales compared to Dh1.6 billion in Q4 2015.

Communities considered as prime residences include Emirates Hills, Palm Jumeirah, Downtown Dubai, Dubai Marina, Jumeirah Islands, Meadows, Lakes, Victory Heights, Business Bay, Jumeirah Lakes Towers and Arabian Ranches.

The overall residential market on the contrary showed a decline in sales from the previous quarter, revealing a 16 per cent drop in total value of sales from Dh6.9 billion to Dh5.8 billion.

The increase in prime residential market sales can be atttributed to a slight decline in price points (in Dh/sqft) over the last quarter by one per cent compared to the overall residential market which declined by two per cent from the last quarter.

Prices in the prime residential markets are 28 per cent higher than the overall market in Q1 2016.

Ian Kirkby, luxury sales director at LuxHabitat, says there is a renewed interest among buyers. “The main reasons include the new accounting policies from private banking in European countries, changes in tax laws in India and the general global economic situation. A lot more ultra high net worth individu-