Dubai: The Cayan Group has lifted the veil on three projects — a twin-tower in Dubai and the other two in Riyadh in Saudi Arabia — as part of a Dh3.5 billion development programme and the biggest from a private developer in the year to date. The twin projects in Riyadh are an upscale gated community spanning 1 million square metres, and the other would be an office building on King Fahd Road where Cayan’s Saudi operations will also have premises.
The new property in Dubai — named “Cayan Cantara” — will in the Umm Suqeim locality and in proximity to the MBR City master-development. Expected to cost Dh1 billion plus, it will feature a residential component and hotel serviced apartments. The developer earlier had a limited pre-launch of the residences, “to test the response of our loyal investor base and during which we received more than what we had anticipated for,” said Ahmad Al Hatti, President and Chairman of Cayan.
The developer of the world’s tallest “twisted” high-rise — the 75-storey, 307-metre Cayan Tower in Dubai Marina — will be releasing 100 of the 700 units at the new project on Monday. Al Hatti declined to mention the pricing set for the launch units. But an off-plan project launched recently by another company in the same neighbourhood had units with a price tag of Dh1,350 a square foot.
“We believe Umm Suqeim will receive the maximum attention from investors this year and the next, and going in for a still emerging area was one way of surprising the market as opposed to a location such as Dubai Marina where we had launched our first project all those years back,” said Al Hatti. “Enabling works starts on site by May and we will have an international operator to manage the serviced apartments.”
Hospitality component
On the decision to launch multiple projects simultaneously, Al Hatti said: “We have consistently believed in these markets and see the present as being right time to be approaching investors with concepts that are out-of-the-box.”
Having a hospitality component immediately adds depth to the new launch, with demand for serviced apartments in Dubai outpacing that for standard hotel rooms through the last two or three years. And even when there was a dip in hotel occupancy through the last quarter of 2014, it was not reflected in serviced apartments, targeting as it does a different — and committed — clientele in GCC families.
For the gated community project in Riyadh, the developer had been holding the land for some time. Some of the plots will be built by Cayan, while those for the very premium properties — the “palaces” — would be up to the individual investors to come in with their own designs.
“It’s a misconception that vacant land of this magnitude is not available in Riyadh,” said Al Hatti. “For the second project we wanted to develop an office building that Cayan can use for its own offices and where we can lease the rest of the available space.
“All three projects [including the one in Dubai] have had their design finalised.
“On the drawing board is another project for Riyadh, which we plan to be a mixed-use one. We are yet to finalise when that should be launched.”
