The panorama is changing at Jumeirah Golf Estates (JGE). Over the past couple of years, people have visited JGE to play a round of golf at the Greg Norman-designed Earth and Fire courses, to see the golfing stars during the PGA Race to Dubai Championships or to check on the progress of their residential projects.
From last month, however, JGE is more than just a place to visit — it is home. The first batch of residents has received the keys to the villas and the residents are now moving into the Mediterranean-styled residential golf community. The developer, meanwhile, is beavering away to complete the rest of the 1,100-hectare development, which will feature 1,050 residences ranging from three- to six-bedroom villas when completed. Around 75 per cent of the villas overlook the golf courses, which meander through JGE’s 13 sub-communities.
The sub-communities in the Earth district are named Whispering Pines, Lime Tree Valley, Olive Point, Sanctuary Falls, Wild Flower and The Sundials, while the Fire district consists of Orange Lakes, Sienna Lakes, Sienna Views, Juniper Way, Valencia Grove, Flame Tree Ridge East and West and Fireside.
Yousuf Kazim, the hands-on General Manager of JGE, tells Property Weekly he can’t wait to get everything ready as soon as possible.
JGE is a very large development. You have started handing over the first batch of 160 Whispering Pines villas in the Earth district. What’s next?
Yes, the very first resident got his keys to the villa in October and told us he was glad after all these years to end up with the quality he expected. We’re sending out letters to our other customers, around 145 of them, to come and take over the villas in batches.
We still have 15 villas for sale in Whispering Pines and we registered a lot of interest in them at Cityscape Global. We’re also working very hard to complete the landscaping to get the whole community done.
Incidentally, wasn’t Chi’s Lime Tree Valley to be handed over first?
Yes, we planned for them to be released first, because, to be fair, Chi was the first sub-developer to finish its villas. But there were still some technical things that needed to be done in the overall community of JGE to get everyone connected. As we didn’t want to lose time, it practically made more sense to start at another point.
But they’re handing over in no time after us and so will the developers of Olive Point and Sienna Lakes. Between them and Whispering Pines, we expect to have handed over 390 villas by the end of this year.
You recently said 99 villas of the Flame Tree Ridge community, which you’re also developing, will be ready for handover early next year?
Yes, we’re still on track and want to hand over Flame Tree Ridge, which is around 70-75 per cent complete, as well as Fireside, also developed by us and more than 80 per cent complete, in the first quarter of next year.
We have show villas available in both communities for clients to come and have a look. We have just launched 19 standard villas in Fireside, meaning we’re allowing customers to do their own fittings.
You’ve been building homes in Whispering Pines, Flame Tree Ridge and Fireside and selling plots in Wild Flower and Juniper Way, while the other communities are in the hands of sub-developers. What is happening on this front?
We’ve put the 93 Wildflower plots on sale. We’re selling them mainly to individuals, offering an opportunity to build their dream home, while staying in the overall design guidelines of JGE.
However, Damac has taken 33 of those plots. We haven’t launched the sale of land in Juniper Way, which consists of 70 plots, but we are trying to get other sub-developers involved.
When do you envisage the landscaping to be done for the communities that are ready to be moved into?
For the Lime Tree Valley East and West, Olive Point, Sienna Lakes and Whispering Pines communities, we’ve already awarded the contract to Al Bayader Landscaping to finish the landscape work. We also awarded a contract to a company called Akar to do the ring-road landscaping, including the beautification of the two entrances on Shaikh Mohammad Bin Zayed Road and Al Faye Road.
We intend to have greenery along the ring road that surrounds the project, giving it the resort feel we seek. We look at our project as a leisure and sporting residential community with a resort theme — a place to live and play. That ambience needs to be felt.
The golf courses are already in full swing and you also have the rather attractive temporary golf course. When will the permanent clubhouse be ready?
We’re working on the clubhouse. It is very large at 130,000 sq ft, so we will open it in phases. The first, which will open in September next year, will have fantastic sunset views from the second floor. We’re currently looking at operators for the spa, gym, retail outlets and restaurants.
We’ve also finished the Tour (Golf) Academy, which will be operational this month, in time for the PGA European Championship Golf Tour on November 14-17.
You have the leisure components sorted out, but the closest amenities, in terms of convenience stores, schools and the like, would be Green Community and Dubai Sports City. Are you looking at your own community facilities in this respect?
Yes, we are indeed seriously thinking about all of these matters. We need to have hospitals or clinics, schools and so on close to our project. We’re currently studying where to put them.
We need a supermarket for groceries — that will be our priority. We’ll be trying to get this launched as quickly as possible — a year for me is too much. I want to have a plan in place before the end of the year, with all parties signing an agreement to provide these facilities, so they have 12-18 months to finish it.
I expect the majority of the homeowners, who are of different nationalities (this also needs to be taken into account in our planning), to move into JGE within two years, so you should have all the facilities available by then.
Do you see the rest of the communities within the Earth and Fire districts completed quickly?
I am putting in utmost effort so everything we currently have on our plate is done by the end of the year. If we’re focused, we will achieve it. As far as the future is concerned, as we complete each section we’re adding great value to this project and we have a lot of interest from various investors to develop lands, villas, etc.
The way we deal with sub-developers is we complement each other. In terms of communities, which are also moving forward within the Earth district, the developer of Sanctuary Falls, Shaikh Holdings, will resume construction shortly and a new developer has taken charge of completing The Sundials and construction will resume very soon.
In the Fire district, construction at Orange Lakes by its current developer is continuing and the developer of Sienna Views is finalising the required authorisation to start construction.
What about the Water and Air districts? I know they stayed on the drawing board as future plans, but if the Dubai Expo 2020 goes ahead, is there an opportunity to revisit the plans?
As far as Water and Air are concerned, if Expo 2020 takes place here and when we have successfully completed our current phases, then we’ll be able to concentrate on them. Again, what I hear is that there are a lot of investors who are interested in our development and the surrounding area, so we’ll be talking to sub-developers.
Today we are in reality and not on the drawing board like others are. We now have the infrastructure in place, so we’re selling serviced plots. The risk element is very low here.
We learnt a lot from developing JGE and continue to learn. Eventually, we’ll be doing something else, thanks to our experience.
