Industrial and Logistics

Showing posts for industrial and logistics

2 April 2025

Dubai Metro Blue Line: Transforming Real Estate and Connectivity

The Dubai Metro has played a pivotal role in the city’s development since its launch in 2009. The addition of the Blue Line underscores the government’s commitment to seamless public transport solutions, aligning with the Dubai 2040 Urban Master Plan. With a goal to have 55% of residents within 800 metres of mass transit stations, the Blue Line will serve as a critical component of this vision, fostering sustainable growth and accessibility.
11 March 2025

Sheikh Zayed Road: Dubai’s Newest Freehold Area – What it Means for Investors

The recent decision by the Dubai Land Department (DLD) to allow private property owners of properties on Sheikh Zayed Road (from the Trade Centre Roundabout to the Water Canal) and Al Jaddaf area to convert their ownership status to freehold to all nationalities marks a pivotal shift in the city’s property landscape. This move is set to redefine investment dynamics […]
26 February 2025

Dubai Residential Market Performance 2024

The Gulf’s macroeconomic performance remains impressive, with the UAE leading the charge. While macroeconomic cycles have not disappeared, investors can take confidence in the fact that their impact has been significantly less in the past decades. The positive macro signals correlated strongly with exceptional real estate performance.
15 January 2025

Currency Adjustment Real Estate Indices: An Update to 2025

When we introduced currency adusted real estate indices six years ago, we argued that alongside multinational corporates,[1] international real estate investors are inadvertent currency speculators, facing currency risk from unhedged investments. We pointed out that they receive two returns: the performance of the real estate itself, and then a gain or loss as a result of changes in the value of the currency in which the real estate performs and that of the overseas investor. Since then the argument that currency volatility can be significant, and the return from the currency can sometimes swamp the performance of the real estate in domestic currency has been amply demonstrated.
18 December 2024

Benchmarking Key Indicators for Saudi Giga-projects: Challenges, Methodologies and Solutions

Saudi Arabia has embarked upon a massive development programme as part of its Vision 2030 plan. This programme includes 14 large-scale and ambitious developments, which it is calling ‘giga-projects’. The most well-known of these is NEOM, but other projects include ROSHN, the Red Sea Project and Jeddah Central.
9 December 2024

Branded Residences: Four Key Considerations

The significance of brands and branding for the consumer goods industry is beyond the slightest doubt. The combination of generational effects and online marketing has served to reinforce their importance during the last two decades. Nowhere is this more obvious than in the Gulf, where branded luxury goods, in particular, have formed a larger percentage of consumer spending than anywhere else.
11 November 2024

Dubai’s Office Market Performance – Autumn 2024

Quality of office real estate driving occupancy In the third quarter of 2024, strong demand and heightened leasing activity drove rents higher in Dubai’s office market. City-wide office rents increased by 21% compared to the previous year. Notably, average Grade A rents in DIFC experienced a 20% annual increase, reaching AED 317 per sqft per annum. In nearby Downtown Dubai, […]
6 August 2024

Value Through Infrastructure Development: The Case of Gulf ports

The rise of Gulf ports The history of seafaring throughout the Gulf is well known. The construction of the famous Arab dhow and the existence of extensive fisheries across the region in what are now the countries of the UAE, Oman and Saudi Arabia are part of a proud tradition that urban planners wish to capture. More recently, Gulf governments […]
16 July 2024

A tale of two markets: Capitalising on arbitrages through retrofits

The Dubai real estate market has been on a spectacular bull run with prices reaching an all-time high of AED 1,397/sqft in July, 2024. This represents an appreciation of over 78% from the market trough reached in April 2009 and, more importantly, prices are approximately 13.2% above the previous peak of September 2014. However, when diving into the granular details, […]
24 June 2024

Natural disasters, resilience and value

The impact of natural disasters Recent adverse weather conditions in the UAE have focused attention on the impact of natural disasters on real estate. This includes impacts associated with climate change, such as flooding caused by changes in precipitation patterns and also the potential impact of rising sea levels, increasing heatwaves and regional droughts. However, the events in the UAE […]
26 April 2024

Private equity and real estate in the gulf: Three reasons to be positive

Introduction: Why private equity matters Worldwide, private equity funds closed deals worth $124 billion in just the fourth quarter of 2023. Fully a quarter of all merger and acquisition deals last year involved private equity.[1] As concerns over inflationary headwinds, rising interest rates and general macro uncertainty diminish, markets such as the Gulf have become increasingly attractive. The prospect of […]
18 January 2023

How effective is real estate as an inflation hedge? A perspective from the Gulf

GCC Inflation: perception and reality At the beginning of 2023, the consensus perspective is that the global economy is far from out of the inflationary woods yet. After a global average of 8.8% last year, opinions now diverge as to the curve of the downward trajectory this year, from the IMF’s global estimate in October 2022 of 6.5%1, to a […]

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