When you buying a property that is under construction, you can do everything from abroad, no need to come here, when you transfer the money, you're not transferring it to the developer, you're not transferring it to the brokers, you're transferring it to the specific bank account, whatever guys you can see around, wasn't here 20 years ago. Hey guys, welcome to my channel. Today I have a guest, my husband Dennis, he's a real estate agent and in this video we're going to talk about how to buy an apartment in Dubai. Please can you tell us what are the main things people need to know if they want to buy property in Dubai? Okay, well first of all, people need to know that here in Dubai we have two types of areas where people can buy a property. One of them is called freehold, another one is leasehold. If you are a foreigner, you can own a property only in the freehold areas and if you are considering a lease hold there you can buy a right to use the property, basically a lease for a long period of time like 99 years. It's usually whatever you can see online that for sale it's a freehold property and especially new developments and basically developers as well are building mainly in the freehold but just keep it in mind that if you buy a property and you are the foreigner you need to focus on the freehold areas. This is one of the important things that people need to know and another thing is that when you are purchasing the property in Dubai like if it's a freehold you become a proper owner and even like your kids can inherit the property because there are some things related to to the Muslim countries where there is a specific law for the inheritance. Here it doesn't really apply so if you buy the property you are a proper owner and then your kids can inherit it. So this is like some basic basic things about the properties. And what is the difference between ready property and of plan property? Okay, in Dubai as Dubai is a young city whatever guys you can see around wasn't here 20 years ago. Developers I keep on building here new projects because it's a young city yes I said. So as a buyer you can choose between the ready property or you can buy a property that is still under construction. So what are the main differences there? So when you buying a property that is still under construction first of all you don't have to put all the money up front because there are payment plans and you need to follow the installments. In some cases even the developer can give you the keys before you even finish all payments. So there is a post-hand over payment plan. So let's say you pay it 50% you can get the keys and you have three years to cover another 50% and right now it's a very very popular payment plan. And obviously when you're buying from the developer you have a more option to choose from rather than on the resale market because like okay the person who wants to sell his property but this is a three-bedroom apartment on the seven's floor. So like you want to buy a three-bedroom apartment on the higher floor lower floor. So from developers usually it's easier. The advantage of the resale market is that there especially with the current situation there are some sellers who urgently need money and they might sell it like below the market price. So this is an advantage of the resale market. When you're buying a property that is under construction you can do it everything from abroad. No need to come here and like like 90% of transactions right now are happening this way. So you don't have to be here because here we have all the structure, all the laws and regulations that protect things, rest of the investor who's buying from abroad. And on the second-degree market you need to come here and it usually takes around one month, months and a half to complete the transaction. This is this is some of the main differences. What does the documents require to buy property in Dubai? It's very very simple. You need to have your passport copy and you need to have a money. Basically that's it. But it comes to the off-line purchase when you buy from directly from the developer. As I said you can do everything from abroad so we just need your passport copy. That's it from the document. So obviously we need your email, we need your address, you need your phone number and the developer will prepare the reservation agreement. They will send to the client and like everything is very very simple. Yeah! Oh it's simple. For the secondary market it's pretty much the same. If it's a cash purchase you just need to have your passport copy and the money. For the mortgage you need to have a pre-approval from the bank before you start looking for the properties. Then again it's a passport copy and some documents from the bank. The process is very simple and one more thing that I can highlight when it comes to the off-line projects is that when you transfer the money you don't transfer it to the developer, you don't transfer it to the brokers. You transfer it to the specific bank account that is called like Escore account and when you transfer this money to this bank account the developer can just take it and use it for whatever reason if you want. This bank account is regulated by the government. The developer can use this money only towards the payment for the construction of the property and the small part of it goes for the marketing. What are the most popular areas today where people buy properties? In Dubai it's usually like the most popular areas that have access to the water, like waterfront properties. We're talking about Dubai Marina, Palm Dumerium. Specifically in this year we have a very high demand for the townhouses. Dubai hills, there the prices increased significantly during this year. Overall the most popular area was and still remains Dubai Marina. What are the starting prices to buy property today? If it's a waterfront project and new development it will be around like $320,000. It's for the one bedroom apartment. In the areas that are not next to the water you can get the one bedroom for around $200,000 and the studio starts from $120,000. And again you have a payment plan so you don't have to put all the money up front. What people should know to avoid scammers in Dubai when they buy property? Whenever it comes to the like big amounts of money there are always some kind of risk involved. But if the buyer is working as a proper advisor there is no chance that you will end up with some kind of scam. People need to keep in mind that whenever they buying a property on the off-line market they should always pay their money only towards the escrow account. This is very very important. How you can check if it's an escrow account or not? There are like websites on Dubai Land Department where you can search for the project and see if there is an escrow account or not. Even if somebody is saying you this is an escrow account, there's an escrow and check it. The escrow account should have a spot the name of the project so if there is a abc tower where you want to buy there should be abc tower trust account or escrow account written on the bank account. This is very very important. I had a case with my client who bought the property he transferred the money to the escrow account. There were some issues with the project he got his money back. It took some time but he got his money back. So if you buying an off-line, please transfer the money only towards the escrow account. Don't transfer it to the developer account because you expose yourself to the risk. For the risk sale, don't give any checks to the seller before the transfer. You can give it to the broker. If it's a licensed broker, they can keep the check with them but don't give any money to the seller before the transfer. Because there are cases when somebody saying go give me 10% now and later on we will make the new one when we will complete the transfer date, cash the check and make it disappear. So this is an important thing. The most important thing is try to find a good advisor with whom you can sit and discuss all these things and who can assist you with your research and can highlight some of the projects that might suit you. Okay then, thank you very much for this information. Guys, I will leave the link to his content details in the description under this video. If you have any questions, you can always reach out to him. And thank you for watching. I will see you in the next video. Bye bye.