Law brought to bear on UAE property developers
April 9, 2009 by Mark Pollak
There’s a new legal force in town and it’s determined to usher in a new era of obedience in the UAE property market. Although the Dubai government probably would hire Judge Dread (’I AM the law’) on a retainer if it could, it’s settling for a brand new property court which has already attracted the attention of real estate builders and buyers alike.
The imaginatively titled Dubai Property Court made its first ruling earlier this month and is already developing something of a reputation for serving individual property investors well. Early judgements have included ordering developers to hand back cash to buyers, with interest, after builders failed to obey registration rules.
500 cases running already
According to Emriates Business, the real estate court already has more than 500 cases on the books, not even a month after its first full ruling, and is “overwhelmed” with the number of disputes. Of course there’s an understandably large queue after it opened, but from the outside looking in, it doesn’t bode well for the image of Dubai real estate. In fact it could harm that magic buzzword of “confidence”.
But at least the court is there. Senior legal consultant at Fichte & Co, Alex Jacob, writes in Emirates Business and points out Dubai’s legal system “only 10 years ago did not even know the concept of private real property”.
Legal framework still in its infancy
That’s a staggering idea when you take into account that until recently the real estate market in the emirate was seen as the most profitable in world. Now it has to build up its own legal property history from scratch when other nations have hundreds of years’ worth of real estate rulings to refer to.
But then like a lot of things in the UAE, where once there was nothing, a grand and important project will emerge out of the dust. At least you don’t need credit approval to run a real estate court.
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