Housing rents in Abu Dhabi’s Al Reef Downtown rose 17 per cent during the first three months of 2014 while rent rises in the capital’s more glamorous areas slowed.
Average rents for a one-bedroom apartment in Al Reef Downtown, about half an hour's drive from Abu Dhabi city centre, currently stand at Dh75,000 to Dh80,000 – up from Dh65,000 to Dh70,000 at the start of the year, according to the property broker Asteco.
Two-bedroom apartment rents in the area, which has been traditionally known as a cheaper alternative to living in the city centre, have risen from Dh80,000 to Dh85,000 at the start of the year to between Dh85,000 and Dh100,000.
Al Reef was also the area showing the greatest increase in villa rents over the period with an average 7 per cent rise over the quarter and by 23 per cent over the year to stand at between Dh130,000 and Dh140,000 for a three bedroom villa.
The news came just a day after propertyfinder.ae reported that another budget area, Khalifa City, was the district most searched last year on its property portal as hard- pressed tenants looked for cheaper accommodation.
Meanwhile apartment rents in most of Abu Dhabi’s more well-heeled areas rose by between 1 and 3 per cent Asteco reported.
It said that average rents for apartments on the Corniche, still one of Abu Dhabi’s glitziest locations rose by an average of 3 per cent over the past three months standing at between Dh120,000 and Dh150,000 for a two-bedroom apartment. Meanwhile in the posh suburbs of Khalidiya and Al Bateen, rents did not rise at all over the quarter, remaining at Dh130,000 to Dh178,000 for a two-bedroom apartment.
Asteco reported that overall, apartment rents in Abu Dhabi remained static during the quarter, down from an overall 5 per cent average rise the previous quarter.
It said that average rents had fallen 1 per cent over the year as declines at the beginning of 2013 were erased by increases later in the year prompted by a government decree requiring all government employees to live in the emirate and a removal of the rental cap.
“Everyone has heard stories that the removal of the rent cap has suddenly meant that a friend of a friend saw his rent go up by 50 per cent,” said Jerry Oates, the general manager of Asteco Abu Dhabi. “But we haven’t yet seen those apocryphal stories coming through in our hard data.”
“Yes, we saw some increases last year when the decree came in and rents are now rising fast in Abu Dhabi’s few more affordable new areas but they don’t yet seem to be rising across the board,” Mr Oates added. “I suspect we will see a change at the lower end of the market over the next quarter as more aggressive rent demands for older properties start to come through.”
Asteco reported that growth in average sales prices for apartments in Abu Dhabi declined slightly from 11 per cent in the final quarter of 2013 to 9 per cent in the first three months of the year. It predicted that the pace of sales price growth would continue to ease through the year.
lbarnard@thenational.ae
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More from Rashmee Roshan Lall
Our family matters legal consultant
Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
$1,000 award for 1,000 days on madrasa portal
Daily cash awards of $1,000 dollars will sweeten the Madrasa e-learning project by tempting more pupils to an education portal to deepen their understanding of math and sciences.
School children are required to watch an educational video each day and answer a question related to it. They then enter into a raffle draw for the $1,000 prize.
“We are targeting everyone who wants to learn. This will be $1,000 for 1,000 days so there will be a winner every day for 1,000 days,” said Sara Al Nuaimi, project manager of the Madrasa e-learning platform that was launched on Tuesday by the Vice President and Ruler of Dubai, to reach Arab pupils from kindergarten to grade 12 with educational videos.
“The objective of the Madrasa is to become the number one reference for all Arab students in the world. The 5,000 videos we have online is just the beginning, we have big ambitions. Today in the Arab world there are 50 million students. We want to reach everyone who is willing to learn.”
UK-EU trade at a glance
EU fishing vessels guaranteed access to UK waters for 12 years
Co-operation on security initiatives and procurement of defence products
Youth experience scheme to work, study or volunteer in UK and EU countries
Smoother border management with use of e-gates
Cutting red tape on import and export of food
Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
Maestro
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UPI facts
More than 2.2 million Indian tourists arrived in UAE in 2023
More than 3.5 million Indians reside in UAE
Indian tourists can make purchases in UAE using rupee accounts in India through QR-code-based UPI real-time payment systems
Indian residents in UAE can use their non-resident NRO and NRE accounts held in Indian banks linked to a UAE mobile number for UPI transactions
Landfill in numbers
• Landfill gas is composed of 50 per cent methane
• Methane is 28 times more harmful than Co2 in terms of global warming
• 11 million total tonnes of waste are being generated annually in Abu Dhabi
• 18,000 tonnes per year of hazardous and medical waste is produced in Abu Dhabi emirate per year
• 20,000 litres of cooking oil produced in Abu Dhabi’s cafeterias and restaurants every day is thrown away
• 50 per cent of Abu Dhabi’s waste is from construction and demolition
THE DETAILS
Kaala
Dir: Pa. Ranjith
Starring: Rajinikanth, Huma Qureshi, Easwari Rao, Nana Patekar
Rating: 1.5/5
Specs
Engine: 51.5kW electric motor
Range: 400km
Power: 134bhp
Torque: 175Nm
Price: From Dh98,800
Available: Now
RESULTS
5pm: Maiden (PA) Dh80,000 1,200m
Winner: Shafaf, Sam Hitchcott (jockey), Ahmed Al Mehairbi (trainer)
5,30pm: Wathba Stallions Cup Handicap (PA) Dh70,000 1,200m
Winner: Noof KB, Tadhg O’Shea, Ernst Oertel
6pm: The President’s Cup Listed (TB) Dh380,000 1,400m
Winner: Taamol, Jim Crowley, Ali Rashid Al Raihe
6.30pm: The President’s Cup Group One (PA) Dh2,500,000 2,200m
Winner: Rmmas, Tadhg O’Shea, Jean de Roualle
7pm: Arabian Triple Crown Listed (PA) Dh230,000 1,600m
Winner: Ihtesham, Szczepan Mazur, Ibrahim Al Hadhrami
7.30pm: Handicap (PA) Dh80,000 1,400m
Winner: AF Mekhbat, Antonio Fresu, Ernst Oertel
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'My Son'
Director: Christian Carion
Starring: James McAvoy, Claire Foy, Tom Cullen, Gary Lewis
Rating: 2/5
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
'Laal Kaptaan'
Director: Navdeep Singh
Stars: Saif Ali Khan, Manav Vij, Deepak Dobriyal, Zoya Hussain
Rating: 2/5
Specs
Engine: Dual-motor all-wheel-drive electric
Range: Up to 610km
Power: 905hp
Torque: 985Nm
Price: From Dh439,000
Available: Now
Points tally
1. Australia 52; 2. New Zealand 44; 3. South Africa 36; 4. Sri Lanka 35; 5. UAE 27; 6. India 27; 7. England 26; 8. Singapore 8; 9. Malaysia 3
