No automatic residency for property buyers in Dubai

Dubai: Property buyers should not expect an automatic residence visa upon purchasing property in Dubai, a top official clarified.

"There is no direct link between property ownership and residence visas. Developers should not lure investors to property sector with a promise of residence visa," Marwan Bin Galita, chief executive of Dubai's Real Estate Regulatory Agency (Rera) told Gulf News on Monday.

Bin Galita said a proposal has been submitted to the concerned authorities to issue property investors a visit visa that allows them to travel in and out of the country to follow up their investments in the property market.

"The suggestion, if approved, might be implemented at a federal level, especially that the local laws of most emirates allow foreign ownership of property.

"The visit visa could replace the residence visa, which was issued by some developers in Dubai for those who bought property in their projects."

Bin Galita said the suggested visa is similar to visas issued by foreign countries for property investors as in the US there are more than 250 kinds of visas.

"Those visas will be of many kinds. For example, it could be for two weeks for the person to come and collect the rent or it could be for another specific time to follow up the issue of the investment," he said.

"The visa will have various privileges in line with the size of the investor's investments, and expires once the owned property is sold. Those who earlier acquired residence visas linked to their properties, could have their status amended, should the new legislation take effect," he said.

He added that if the suggestion was approved, then the visa for those who own properties here and want to enter the country will be applied through the residency department and it will be issued in accordance to the volume of the investment also.

"We have to think about the future and about all the possibilities," he added.

Regulation

He said there is a need to regulate this matter and to look at it from all the sides in order to avoid any problems in the future. "Investors must understand that owning property in Dubai is not a pre-requisite for having a residence visa," he said.

"I need to repeat to people not to mix between the residency visa issue and buying property," he said.

Major General Mohammad Ahmad Al Merri told Gulf News there is nothing called "own property and get life-long residency visa".

He said there are rules for issuing residency visa or visit visa and those rules and regulations are from the Ministry of Interior and nobody else. "We are not dealing with property owners. We are issuing our visas as usual as per the law," he said.