The Emirate has seen over 500 new brokers setting up this year alone and the Real Estate Regulatory Agency (RERA), the regulatory arm of Dubai Land Department, wants to make sure they are compliant.
It has announced the introduction of four new regulations to control brokers at a time when the real estate broker sector is booming due to the recovery in the property market. Overseas buyers are again investing in Dubai led by Indian and British nationals.
‘We are going to introduce four new measures to control the brokers. We had over 8,000 brokerage firms with 10,000 brokers at one time, but now we have 2,205 firms with 5,021 brokers. We saw 567 new firms setting up business this year and we believe the numbers are still high for Dubai,’ said Marwan bin Ghalita, RERA chief executive officer.
The new regulations will come into force next year and will see the pass mark for the mandatory test for renewal of broker’s license rise from 75% to 85%. Also, broker cards will be eliminated, but broker registration will be linked with Emirates identification.
The changes will also mean that new brokerages will be allowed only four broker visas to start with and any increase will depend on their performance. Brokers, who fail to do any transaction for six months to 12 months will have their registration cancelled.
Other changes are being considered. For example there is concern at an industry level that property owners not signing broker contract agreements, known as Form A. RERA is now considering making the contract obligatory before a property can be marketed.
‘If the seller does not signing Form A, the seller will not be able to list the property and sell it through any agent in Dubai,’ he disclosed, adding that a multiple listing system would come in place soon which will limit the listings for the seller in the market.
Since May unified real estate contracts have been mandatory with the aim of protecting the rights of sellers, buyers and brokers in any real estate transaction.
The latest data from the Dubai Land Department show that there were 17,289 real estate transactions worth AED37.5 billion in the first half of the year.
Indian and British buyers topped the list for foreign investment and Jordanian investors led the regional list of buyers.
‘To say that we are delighted with the real investment transaction figures from January to July would be an understatement. We are extremely proud of these positive results, as they reflect a building momentum in Dubai’s real estate market,’ said Sultan Butti Bin Mejren, DLD director general.
‘Dubai’s real estate market has now reasserted itself on both the regional and global stage. We are certain that the future will see even more demand, especially in light of the government's declaration of forthcoming major projects,’ he added.
A breakdown of the figures show that Arab Investors completed a total of 3,058 transactions worth AED6.905 billion in the first half of this year. Jordanians made 640 transactions to the value of AED1.347 billion, with Lebanese nationals second on the list of Arab investors with 459 sales worth a total of AED1.235 billion.
Egyptians came in at third place after being involved in transactions worth AED1.009 billion. Arab investors from Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Sudan, Palestine and Algeria also made significant real estate transactions in the first six months of 2014, with investments below the level of one billion dirhams for each of these nationalities.
Foreign nationals completed on 14,231 property deals worth a total of AED30.533 billion for the first half of 2014. Indians made a total of 4,417 transactions worth AED10.523 billion, followed with British investors with 2,258 transactions worth AED5.811 billion.
In third place was buyers from Pakistani with 3,064 transactions worth AED4.5 billion. Iranian and Canadian investors came in at fourth and fifth place, with transactions worth AED2.7 billion and AED1.9 billion respectively. Citizens from Russia, United States and China occupied sixth, seventh and eighth places, each creating more than AED one billion worth of property investment.
