Dubai: One Dubai developer is ready to look beyond the ‘town square’. And it plans to do so keeping its affordable.
Nshama, which shot into prominence in 2015 by being the first to launch town houses under Dh1 million, is all set to launch two new projects. One will be a tower of about 50 storeys along the Dubai Water Canal, and a second would be a residential community, mid to upscale in what it will offer and take seven years to build. The location for the second was not revealed.
“If you have a good product and at the right price, you can still sell in Dubai whatever the conditions be,” said Fred Durie, CEO of Nshama, which is currently working on the Town Square community off Al Qudra Road.
“For the Town Square, we had a sales round in March — and had the best single-day sales ever. We had a lot of UAE nationals buying property for the first time, whether to live or rent is not the point. New buyers are coming into the market. It’s not the case that nothing’s selling right now.
“We made our mark by launching a masterplanned community — there’s a slightly different mindset to building a 40- or 50-storey building.”
The land for the two projects were acquired early this year. The developer does not see any need to raise new funds to build these, saying existing financing facilities available to it would be enough plus those brought in by unit sales.
On whether the new projects and their locations will be more upscale, the CEO said: “I don’t see us changing our profile of being an affordable developer. We can live with the pressures in the market. What we will not do is put prices up hugely. There will be more of a gradual progression.”
Town Square — which will take up all of 750 acres — already has its first residents in place. Just over 300 units were handed over last year and another 730 homes are going through the process right now.
Steep cost
While it was the sub Dh1 million homes that got buyer interest right from the launch, subsequent sales too have had a smooth run. Right now, of the 7,000 plus units put up for sale, more than 80 per cent have found a buyer. At a time when unsold units can constitute a steep cost for the developer, the 80 per cent plus mark does play well on the Nshama numbers.
And there’s quite a lot more to get through. “Eventually, there will be 23,000 units and we have always maintained that Town Square will be a 10-year project,” said Durie. “We will hand over 9,500 units by 2020 and we are on schedule for that.
“On the infrastructure side, we are more than 50 per cent complete. On the buildings, we have launched and covered the construction for 9,000 units.”
With more homes being delivered, Town Square prices are starting to inch up in the secondary market. The initial launch prices were around Dh750 a square foot for the town houses and Dh900 plus for the apartments.
A Spinneys supermarket is opening, and talks have been wrapped up for two schools.
“On the retail side, there will be 500 street-side shops and totalling 2.5 million square foot of retail,” the CEO said. “For the health care needs, we will have clinics but not full-scale hospitals. Discussions are on with some operators and obviously this is going to be a key market for them with all these people living here.
“We will announce the health care operator, but the schools will be the first.”
Nshama stretches rental possibilities with 10-year leases
At its Town Square development, Nshama is not just intent on selling. It has set aside 2,500 units up to now for 10-year leases, which are being offered to corporate tenants for their employees.
“These will be separate units and with separate access — we will see how the market grows for these,” said Fred Durie of Nshama. “If that means adding more to the 2,500, we will do that. The demand uptake is very much there.”
