Strata owners could also tap third-party help

Dubai: Selling out to a single owner might not be the only solution opening up in the local commercial property market.

“The issue with strata ownership is that the building gets spread into multiple owners all having multiple thoughts, unlike a single owner landlord who has a management company managing the space and leasing,” said Manish Khatri, vice-president for business development at Aqua Properties.

“If owners get their act together and bring in a management firm to manage their assets as a whole, it will allow for one thought process on the leasing as opposed to now where all owners are competing with one another to lease out. It causes a perfect asset to become fractional.

“The only way to solve the multi-strata owned properties is to get landlords to understand and hire one management to lease administer the whole portfolio. This will bring greater value to the asset as a whole and put in a place a management clause to any new investor to relinquish control on the asset and let the management handle the property and be accountable.”