Dubai Islands

Hello everyone,

Welcome to our first issue, starting with a BANG.

Dubai Islands is currently our top pick in the Dubai Property Market. An area like no other. Five Islands, 60 km waterfront, over 20 km of beaches on only 17 square kilometers. And best of all, still very reasonably priced.

It is probably the hottest area for real estate investment in Dubai with excellent potential to appreciate.

As Dubai is not allowing further offshore land reclamation, Dubai Islands is one of the last proper beachfront developments.

Low density Island living

What makes Dubai Islands even more special is that it is a low-density development. It includes villas and mid-rise residential buildings with large green open spaces, parks, beaches, marinas, resorts, golf courses, country clubs and other sports and leisure areas.

Those of you who have been around longer might remember: this development was initially called Palm Deira. It was supposed to become the largest of three palm shaped man-made islands. The other two of the trio are Palm Jumeirah and Palm Jebel Ali.

During the Global Financial Crisis of 2009, development came to a stop when part of the land had been reclaimed.

What about traffic?

When first hearing about Dubai Islands, TRAFFIC was the major concern coming to mind. Especially as the islands are located next to the Deira Gold Souq, an extremely congested area of Dubai. However, Dubai‘s Infrastructure plans have taken this into account. The AED 5 bn Shindagha Corridor Project is designed to ease traffic flow in this area and includes several bridges and new roads connecting Dubai Islands to Downtown. Among other, there will be a 1.4km four lane bridge connecting Dubai Islands to Bur Dubai, serving 16,000 cars per hour in each direction.

Given the large proportion of the islands reserved for greenery, parks and leisure areas, this will be a truly unique development like no other in Dubai.

A number of mid-rise buildings have been launched in the last 6 - 9 months. Most of them are from smaller developers, except Bay Grove Residences and Bay Residence by Nakheel and Ellington Cove by Ellington. However the designs and specifications are very high end. Price per square foot however is similar to much less luxurious developments in prime areas or even in less attractive locations.

Excellent value for money

Launch prices for apartments in Dubai Islands started from around AED 1,500- 2,000 per sqft mid of 2024 and have been steadily increasing. Pricing of recent launches are more in the range of AED 2,500 to 3,000 per sqft. This increase is partly due to increased popularity. But also, because most more recently launches are directly at the beach and have sea view from most units. There is also a race to higher quality. The first buildings launched were already quite luxurious. Most have 3.2 m ceiling height, top to bottom windows and high-end interior. However, developers are trying to top each other, leading to more and more luxurious facilities and interior fit out.

Similar developments sell at twice the price

As a comparison, Bluewaters Residences were launched at approximately AED 2,200 per sqft in 2017. In Q4 2024 the average sale price (as per DLD) was more than 5,250 per sqft. In my view, the apartments on Dubai Island are more attractive, especially some of the recent launches. The buildings are more luxurious and the Island has lots of beaches and green spaces. The development also includes a very large shopping mall.

At the time of writing this, the following buildings were launched:

Many of those buildings are already sold out or have only a few units available. If you want to secure a good unit, you need to be quick. At the launch date the best units are often sold out. If you want to select the unit you like, you need to give an Expression of Interest to the developer before the launch date together with a refundable deposit.

Below is a list of projects that are about to be launched:

Our website is regularly being updated for new launches and if you would like to sign up as member, you can set up alerts by WhatsApp to be informed of new projects as soon as we hear about them.

In case you would like to know more please visit our website and if you are seriously interested, we are more than happy to put you in touch with a specialist for Dubai Islands.

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Stay tuned,

M&M