Investing · Dubai
Property investment in Dubai
Every guide to investing in Dubai property says the same three things — no tax, high yields, prices rising — and prints no figure for any of them. This page is the figures. The Land Department records every sale and every tenancy in the city; read together, the two registers say what a home here actually rents for against what it sells for, what a dirham of Dubai property did year by year, including the fall, and what it costs to get in, hold and get out.
Read this first
The return has two halves, and the register measures both
A property pays twice: the rent while you hold it, and the difference in price when you sell. Brochures quote the first as a promise and the second as a chart that only goes up. Here is what the record says.
The rent half. Over the twelve months to 15 Sept 2026 the Land Department registered 555,102 tenancies through Ejari, and the median paid AED 73.9 a square foot a year. Over the twelve months to 11 Sept 2026 it registered 45,037 completed-home resales at a median AED 1,423 a square foot. One over the other is 5.2%: the gross yield of the median Dubai home, before the service charge, a manager and the weeks between tenants — which, worked below, take it to about 4.0%.
The price half. Ten years ago the median completed resale was AED 913 a foot; so far this year it is AED 1,432 — +57%, or 4.6% a year compound. That is the whole journey, and it was not a straight line: from AED 991 in 2014 the median fell to AED 719 in 2020, a 27% fall over 6 years, and did not pass the 2014 figure again until 2022. A buyer at the top waited 8 years to be whole on price, and was paid the rent while waiting. The table below gives the same reading for every year.
What this page is not. It is the past, recorded, not a forecast; and we are a brokerage, so we sell the thing being measured — the register does not care either way, which is why it is the source. A city median moves with what sold as well as with what it sold for, and no one home is the median. For a particular building, its own page holds its own recorded history; start with Dubai property prices.
The price half
What a dirham of Dubai property did, year by year
For each year, the median price per square foot of every completed home resold in it, and what that median is worth at this year's — AED 1,432 a foot so far in 2026. Read down the "bought in" column for the year you would have bought.
| Bought in | Median AED/sqft | Resales that year | Held | To 2026 | A year, compound |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013 | 928 | 35,175 | 13 years | +54% | +3.4% |
| 2014the peak | 991 | 27,553 | 12 years | +45% | +3.1% |
| 2015 | 928 | 19,638 | 11 years | +54% | +4.0% |
| 2016 | 913 | 16,098 | 10 years | +57% | +4.6% |
| 2017 | 894 | 16,827 | 9 years | +60% | +5.4% |
| 2018 | 864 | 11,083 | 8 years | +66% | +6.5% |
| 2019 | 766 | 11,953 | 7 years | +87% | +9.3% |
| 2020the trough | 719 | 13,547 | 6 years | +99% | +12.2% |
| 2021 | 877 | 26,983 | 5 years | +63% | +10.3% |
| 2022 | 1,053 | 41,431 | 4 years | +36% | +8.0% |
| 2023 | 1,140 | 49,930 | 3 years | +26% | +7.9% |
| 2024 | 1,240 | 57,220 | 2 years | +15% | +7.5% |
| 2025 | 1,382 | 58,406 | 1 year | +4% | +3.6% |
| 2026so far | 1,432 | 27,654 | — | — | — |
Completed-home resales registered at the Dubai Land Department, every residential property type, through 11 Sept 2026; off-plan sales are kept out, because a launch price is a developer’s schedule and not a market. The change is between two city-wide medians, and a median moves with what sold as well as with what it sold for: a year in which more of the resales were in Downtown reads dearer than one in which more were in International City, whatever either did. It is the right reading for the city and the wrong one for any single home, whose own building page carries its own history. The table starts at 2013, the first year the register holds 30,000 completed resales; the years before it record a city being built rather than traded — the city median rose through 2009 and 2010, when Dubai’s prices are widely reported to have fallen by around half, because the homes changing hands changed faster than their prices did — and a row for them would mislead. A buyer at the 2014 peak is +45% today; a buyer at the 2020 trough +99%.
The rent half
What each kind of home rents for against what it sells for
The city's median annual rent and median completed resale for each layout, from the two registers over the same twelve months, and the gross yield between them. The last column is the one the American '2% rule' asks for: a month's rent as a share of the price.
| Layout | Median rent, a year | Tenancies | Median resale | Resales | Gross yield | A month’s rent, % of price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Studio | 40,000 | 99,156 | 560,000 | 7,963 | 7.1% | 0.60% |
| One bedroom | 59,000 | 207,409 | 1,050,000 | 14,724 | 5.6% | 0.47% |
| Two bedrooms | 77,000 | 162,467 | 1,959,216 | 9,249 | 3.9% | 0.33% |
| Three bedrooms | 120,000 | 33,001 | 3,518,740 | 2,546 | 3.4% | 0.28% |
| Villa or townhouse | 175,000 | 52,487 | 3,800,000 | 5,260 | 4.6% | 0.38% |
Medians of the year’s registered tenancies and of the year’s completed resales for the same layout, city-wide, in AED, read on the dates each layout page carries (the newest 14 Sept 2026); apartments for the four apartment rows, everything the register types as a villa or townhouse for the fifth. Two populations, not the same homes, so the yield is the register’s shape rather than any one flat’s figure — and the shape is consistent: the smaller the home, the more of its price it earns a year. Gross, before everything below. Each layout opens its own page, which carries the same two figures area by area; a community’s area guide carries both registers for the place.
Gross is the figure on the brochure; net is the figure you bank. Take the one-bedroom the register describes: 795 square feet, resold for a median AED 1,050,000, let for a median AED 59,000 a year — 5.6% gross. A service charge at AED 18 a square foot, the low end of the band for a newer tower, is AED 14,310 a year; a manager at the conventional 5% of the rent is AED 2,950. What is left, AED 41,740, is 4.0% of the price before a week of void or a repair. The rental yield calculator does this sum for any price, rent and service charge; service charges and Mollak is where the charge comes from and how to check a building’s before you buy.
Where the buying is
The ten communities where the most homes changed hands
Not a recommendation — where the money went. The communities with the most completed resales in the last twelve months, with what they resold for a square foot and how that moved on the year. Each name opens its area guide, which carries both registers for the place.
| Community | Resales, 12 months | Median AED/sqft | Year on year |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jumeirah Village Circle | 4,278 | 1,312 | +6% |
| Business Bay | 2,397 | 1,886 | +6% |
| Dubai Marina | 1,832 | 1,892 | +12% |
| Mohammed Bin Rashid City | 1,595 | 2,038 | +2% |
| Downtown Dubai | 1,408 | 2,538 | +1% |
| International City | 1,371 | 661 | +4% |
| Arjan | 1,337 | 1,354 | +11% |
| Dubai Creek Harbour (The Lagoons) | 1,234 | 2,330 | +4% |
| Dubai Sports City | 1,219 | 937 | +8% |
| Dubai Hills Estate | 1,185 | 2,305 | +4% |
Completed-home resales over the twelve months to 11 Sept 2026, and the median price per square foot over them, for the communities the city league carries (twenty or more such resales). Volume is where the market is liquid — where a home is easiest to buy and, later, to sell — not where it is best; the full league by price is on Dubai property prices, the cheap end on the cheapest areas, and the dearest towers on the best residential buildings.
The costs
What it costs to get in, to hold, and to get out
Regulation stated as regulation, convention as convention. The one-off costs do not reduce the yield; they lengthen the payback, which is why the round trip matters more to an investor than to a family buying a home to keep.
- Getting in
- The Dubai Land Department’s transfer fee, 4% of the price, paid by the buyer; AED 580 for the title deed; the registration trustee’s AED 4,000 plus VAT, or AED 2,000 plus VAT under AED 500,000; and, by convention, 2% commission plus VAT to the agent who brought you the home. Around 6.5% of the price in cash on the day for a cash buyer. With a mortgage, 0.25% of the loan plus AED 290 to register it, a valuation of a few thousand dirhams, and the bank’s arrangement fee, commonly up to 1% of the loan.
- Holding
- The service charge, per square foot a year, to the owner and never the tenant: AED 10 to 18 a foot in older or simpler buildings, 18 to 30 in newer towers with the full set of amenities, 30 and well beyond at the premium addresses, a few dirhams a foot for a villa in a managed community. A manager, if you use one, at a conventional 5% of the rent. District cooling where the owner carries the capacity charge. Dubai levies no annual property tax; the municipality’s housing fee, 5% of the rent, is the occupant’s.
- Getting out
- By convention the seller pays their own agent 2% plus VAT; the developer’s no-objection certificate, commonly AED 500 to 5,000 as the developer sets it; and any mortgage is settled before transfer, with the bank’s early-settlement charge, capped by the Central Bank at 1% of the balance or AED 10,000, whichever is less. There is no capital gains tax on an individual’s sale in the UAE.
- The round trip
- About 8.5% of the price to buy and sell, for a cash purchase: around 6.5% in and 2% or so out. At the city’s gross yield that is about 20 months of rent, and at the net figure worked above about 26, before the price has to move at all. The rent vs buy calculator counts those years; the payback line on the rental yield calculator counts them for a let.
The transfer fee, deed, trustee and mortgage-registration figures are the Land Department’s schedule as the site last checked it; commission and the manager’s share are the market’s convention; the service-charge bands are a reading of the approved rates, and each building’s own rate is on the department’s service charge index. Checked 14 Sept 2026. The full bill, worked on a AED 2 million purchase with and without a mortgage, is in the cost of buying property in Dubai.
Who can buy
Who can invest, and what a purchase gives you beyond the rent
Ownership, borrowing, residence and tax, each in a sentence, with the page that has the rest.
Anyone, in the freehold areas. Dubai’s property law (Law No. 7 of 2006) opens outright ownership to non-UAE nationals in the areas designated for it, which is most of the modern city — read from the Land Department’s own mark on every tenancy, the freehold areas are listed with the share of each district that qualifies. No residence visa is needed to buy, a foreign buyer pays the same fees as a national, and a purchase can be completed from abroad through a notarised power of attorney; buying property in Dubai as a foreigner walks the whole sequence from Form F to the deed.
Borrowing is sized by the Central Bank before it is sized by the bank: a resident expatriate buying a first home under AED 5 million puts down at least 20%, and a non-resident is lent to on the bank’s own policy, commonly with a larger deposit and at a rate the broker negotiates. What buyers in each district actually borrowed, from the register’s own mortgage rows, is on mortgage brokers in Dubai; the mortgage calculator turns a price into the cash for completion day.
Residence follows ownership. Property worth AED 750,000 or more currently supports a two-year investor visa, and AED 2,000,000 or more the ten-year Golden Visa, both through the Land Department and both on conditions that have moved before — the Golden Visa through property has the rules as last checked. On tax: no personal income tax, no capital gains tax and no annual property tax apply to an individual owner here, and as we read the corporate-tax rules an individual’s own rental income is outside them; a company owner, and anyone taxed on worldwide income at home, should take advice. Letting the home from another country is property management in Dubai; selling it, when the time comes, is sell property in Dubai.
Questions people ask
Investing in Dubai property, answered
Is Dubai good for property investment?
The register can say what it has been, not what it will be. Over the twelve months to 15 Sept 2026 the median Dubai tenancy paid AED 73.9 a square foot a year against a median completed resale of AED 1,423 a foot — a gross yield of 5.2% before service charges, management and voids. The median resale price per square foot is +57% on 2016, 4.6% a year compound, and on the way it fell 27% from 2014 to 2020 and took until 2022 to pass the 2014 figure again. Whether that is good depends on what else your money could do, on leverage, and on the eight and a half per cent or so it costs to get in and out; this page has every one of those figures.
What is the rental yield in Dubai?
5.2% gross city-wide, measured as the rent register's median per square foot a year over the sale register's median per square foot, both over twelve months. By layout, from the same registers' medians, a studio rents for 7.1% of its price a year, a one-bedroom 5.6%, a three-bedroom apartment 3.4% and a villa 4.6%: the smaller the home, the more of its price it earns each year. Net of a service charge and a manager the figure is commonly one to two points lower — the one-bedroom worked on this page comes out at 4.0% — and every building has its own service charge, so ask for it before believing any yield.
Does Dubai property meet the 2% rule?
No, and nothing in a city of this kind does. The "2% rule" is a North American house-flipper's screen — a month's rent equal to two per cent of the price, which is a 24% gross yield. On the register's medians a Dubai studio rents each month for 0.60% of its price and a one-bedroom for 0.47%; the table on this page has every layout. Read the rule as what it is, a ceiling for distressed stock in cheap markets, and read Dubai against the alternatives a dirham has here: a bank deposit, the bond market, or the same money in London or Singapore, where gross residential yields are commonly lower again.
Will Dubai property prices fall in 2026?
We do not forecast, and nobody who does can show you their record. What the register shows is that they can: the median resale price per square foot fell 27% from AED 991 in 2014 to AED 719 in 2020, 6 years down, and did not pass the 2014 figure until 2022. It also shows where the market is now: AED 1,432 a foot so far in 2026, +5% on the year, on 45,037 completed resales in twelve months. A buyer who could not hold through a fall of that size for that long should size the purchase, or the loan, accordingly.
How much money do I need to invest in Dubai property?
The median completed home resold in the twelve months to 11 Sept 2026 for AED 1.45M; the median studio for AED 560,000 and the median one-bedroom for AED 1,050,000. On top of the price, budget the 4% transfer fee, the registration fees and the 2% commission — around 6.5% of the price in cash on the day. A resident expatriate borrowing for a first home under AED 5 million puts down at least 20% under the Central Bank's rule, so a AED 1 million flat needs roughly AED 270,000 in cash; a non-resident buyer is lent to on the bank's own terms, commonly with a larger deposit. The mortgage calculator turns any price into the cash for the day.
Can a foreigner invest in Dubai property?
Yes. Dubai’s property law (Law No. 7 of 2006) opens outright ownership to non-UAE nationals in the areas designated freehold, which are most of the modern city, with no residence visa required and no extra fee at the counter. A buyer abroad can complete through a notarised power of attorney. Owning property worth AED 750,000 or more currently supports a two-year investor residence visa and AED 2,000,000 or more the ten-year Golden Visa, both through the Land Department, on conditions that have moved before and should be checked on the day you apply.
Is rental income taxed in Dubai?
There is no personal income tax in the UAE, so an individual’s rent is not taxed here, and Dubai levies no annual property tax; the one recurring public charge on a home, the municipality’s housing fee of five per cent of the rent, is paid by the occupant. The UAE’s corporate tax, 9% since June 2023, applies to businesses; as we read the Cabinet decision beneath it, real estate investment income earned by an individual in their own name is outside it. A company that owns the property, and a landlord taxed on worldwide income at home, are different questions — take advice on both. Nothing on this page is tax advice.
Should an investor buy off-plan or a completed home?
They are different trades. A completed home has a recorded resale history, a tenant from day one and a yield you can measure; an off-plan purchase is a payment plan, a delivery date and a developer’s promise, registered on Oqood, with the 4% paid on the day it is registered and a 50% deposit rule on any mortgage. Every figure on this page is completed homes only — off-plan is never blended into a headline median on this site; the reports page carries it on its own line. Off-plan or resale sets the two side by side.
What does it cost to buy and then sell a property in Dubai?
Buying: the Land Department’s 4% transfer fee, AED 580 for the title deed, the registration trustee’s AED 4,000 plus VAT (AED 2,000 under AED 500,000), and, by convention, 2% commission plus VAT — around 6.5% of the price on a cash purchase, with 0.25% of the loan plus AED 290 to register a mortgage on top. Selling: the seller’s own agent at the same 2% by convention, the developer’s no-objection certificate at AED 500 to 5,000 as the developer sets it, and any mortgage settled before transfer. There is no capital gains tax on an individual’s sale. Round trip, about 8.5% of the price, which is why the rent vs buy calculator counts the years before owning beats renting.
Deciding between the two trades? Off-plan or resale sets them side by side, and Oqood is the interim register an off-plan purchase sits on. Would you live in it rather than let it? The rent vs buy calculator asks the other question. Choosing where: every community has an area guide with both registers behind it, the whole league is on Dubai property prices, and what is on the market today starts with property for sale.