Dubai to seize defaulters' properties
25 April 2010
Property owners in Dubai who are not paying up should be worried. The emirate's government is getting ready to seize your home.
Dubai Land Department has started informing investors in default that if they do not pay within two weeks, 40 percent of any money paid so far will be confiscated and their property will be sold at auction, UAE daily the National reported on Sunday.
Mohammed Sultan Thani, the department’s assistant general director, told the newspaper the move will help several delayed and unfinished developments in the city reach completion.
During the boom years, developers sold off-plan homes and offices to buyers, often at inflated prices. As the credit crunch hit the region and property prices fell more than 50 percent in Dubai, many buyers stopped paying their monthly installments on properties that had fallen sharply in value.
Dubai Land Department’s move applies to projects that are 80 percent or more complete, the newspaper reported.
“The idea is to see what we can do before the property is cancelled,” Thani was quoted as saying.
George Ezman, a businessman from the Czech Republic who bought several office units in Jumeirah Business Centre 5, a project by the Dubai developer Al Fajer Properties, has received a Land Department notice, according to the National.
Ezman paid 30 percent of the total cost and is due to pay the remainder on completion. The building was scheduled to be finished in 2008 but has been delayed, the paper said.
He said the developer breached its agreement by delivering the property more than a year late, adding that according to his contract, he has the right to cancel his contract and receive a full refund if the property was late, the paper added.
Source: www.maktoob.com