The developer behind a luxury project on Dubai's World Islands said its first homeowners will move in this year – and that a desire for isolation could deliver more interest in the coming months.
Kleindienst Group said owners who bought into the Heart of Europe project would begin occupying villas on the man-made islands towards the end of 2020.
The project's 10 'palaces' featuring and private beaches have all been sold to mostly GCC buyers, though hundreds of smaller villas and flats remain under construction.
Chairman Josef Kleindienst said actual sales have dropped off due to the coronavirus pandemic, but there has been a rise interested parties.
We sold enough to fund what we are building. And it is important for us to build only what can be sold
"Our sales dropped more than 50 per cent since corona started," he told The National during a tour of the sprawling island development.
“New investors are not buying when they cannot visit."
But he said boats will begin taking investors over to the islands, 4km off the Dubai coast, from June 15.
Development on the World Islands has repeatedly stalled in the years following its construction in 2003 and handover to developers in 2008.
But significant progress on this latest project has been made in the past two years. Today, multistorey apartment and hotel buildings rise up from the low-lying islands.
Half a dozen floating 'seahorse villas' are lined up in a row and beachfront properties near completion.
Mr Kleindienst, an Austrian former police official turned businessman, said he would prove critics wrong.
“I guarantee you by the end of 2020, people will have moved into our villas, floating villas and hotels,” he said.
The restrictions that were put in place because of coronavirus "has only increased productivity here".
"Nobody was allowed on or off the islands, so we were able to get people to work longer hours and pay them overtime.”
Among the flagship properties is a Dh100 million beach palace on 'Sweden Island', now sold, with a price tag that rivals high-end Emirates Hills villas and Downtown penthouses.
Along with wealthy buyers, the project also relies on tourism spend to ensure it is a success.
Mr Kleindienst said the remote location would be attractive to people looking for a holiday, while maintaining social distancing.
“Towards the end of the year, when the project is open, there are two possibilities,” he said.
“Either a solution will have been found for the virus or we will be able to test everyone coming here.
“Everyone who is tested, and found not to have Covid-19, will be free to travel to the island and enjoy a holiday.”
Portofino and Cote D’Azure, the two hotels, together have almost 1,500 rooms, about the same as Atlantis on The Palm.
The global hotel industry is forecast to face significant challenges in the years ahead, but Mr Kleindienst insisted enough of the project has been sold to fund the rest of the work.
This week there were 1,200 workers on site pushed ahead with the hotels and apartments.
“Our master plan allows us to build 4,000 bedrooms. We have 2,000 under construction today," he said.
"We sold enough to fund what we are building.
“It is important for us to build only what can be sold.”
The first of the floating villas sold for Dh5 million, about the same as an upmarket villa in a wealthy Dubai neighbourhood, while the last one to be sold went for Dh20m, he said.
The project has had some setbacks along the way.
It was reported in 2018 that one of the floating villas had sunk near the Burj Al Arab.
Mr Kleindienst said it was an events platform that had fallen into the sea, not one of the prestigious floating villas, as reported by some media, but that it was enough to make buyers think twice about investing.
“We lost agreed sales because of that,” he said.
We are seeing island destinations doing well globally in lockdown and it does have a USP to be successful. It was not something that was going to pop up overnight
Despite the anticipated economic impact of the pandemic, there were 1,824 property sales in Dubai in April, worth Dh3.62 billion, according to Property Finder. Seventy per cent were off-plan projects that are still to be built.
John Stevens, long-standing property consultant in Dubai, said the Heart of Europe project could arrive on the market at the right time.
"Hotels that were offering packages during the quarantine period in Dubai did amazingly well," said Mr Stevens, managing director of property management firm Asteco, which is not involved in the islands project.
"Some had occupancy levels as high as 70 per cent and there seems to be a move to find nice locations to sit it all out.
"The question is how long will it continue for though?"
He also said private villas on a neighbouring island off Dubai were fully booked during the period when a permit was required to leave home and which ended on Friday, April 24.
"This is a huge development with expensive costs, it was never going to be easy to get it off the ground," he said.
"We are seeing island destinations doing well globally in lockdown and it does have a USP to be successful.
"It was not something that was going to pop up overnight."
The World Islands were in the headlines in 2018 when actress Lindsay Lohan announced plans to build her own themed resort there.
The American star of Mean Girls told her followers on Instagram she was planning to build "Lindsayland" in Dubai.
The post received more than 2,000 likes – before being deleted soon after.
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The specs
Engine: 2.2-litre, turbodiesel
Transmission: 6-speed auto
Power: 160hp
Torque: 385Nm
Price: Dh116,900
On sale: now
Ferrari 12Cilindri specs
Engine: naturally aspirated 6.5-liter V12
Power: 819hp
Torque: 678Nm at 7,250rpm
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Dust and sand storms compared
Sand storm
- Particle size: Larger, heavier sand grains
- Visibility: Often dramatic with thick "walls" of sand
- Duration: Short-lived, typically localised
- Travel distance: Limited
- Source: Open desert areas with strong winds
Dust storm
- Particle size: Much finer, lightweight particles
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- Duration: Can linger for days
- Travel distance: Long-range, up to thousands of kilometres
- Source: Can be carried from distant regions
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'How To Build A Boat'
Jonathan Gornall, Simon & Schuster
How to wear a kandura
Dos
- Wear the right fabric for the right season and occasion
- Always ask for the dress code if you don’t know
- Wear a white kandura, white ghutra / shemagh (headwear) and black shoes for work
- Wear 100 per cent cotton under the kandura as most fabrics are polyester
Don’ts
- Wear hamdania for work, always wear a ghutra and agal
- Buy a kandura only based on how it feels; ask questions about the fabric and understand what you are buying
Global Fungi Facts
• Scientists estimate there could be as many as 3 million fungal species globally
• Only about 160,000 have been officially described leaving around 90% undiscovered
• Fungi account for roughly 90% of Earth's unknown biodiversity
• Forest fungi help tackle climate change, absorbing up to 36% of global fossil fuel emissions annually and storing around 5 billion tonnes of carbon in the planet's topsoil
What is blockchain?
Blockchain is a form of distributed ledger technology, a digital system in which data is recorded across multiple places at the same time. Unlike traditional databases, DLTs have no central administrator or centralised data storage. They are transparent because the data is visible and, because they are automatically replicated and impossible to be tampered with, they are secure.
The main difference between blockchain and other forms of DLT is the way data is stored as ‘blocks’ – new transactions are added to the existing ‘chain’ of past transactions, hence the name ‘blockchain’. It is impossible to delete or modify information on the chain due to the replication of blocks across various locations.
Blockchain is mostly associated with cryptocurrency Bitcoin. Due to the inability to tamper with transactions, advocates say this makes the currency more secure and safer than traditional systems. It is maintained by a network of people referred to as ‘miners’, who receive rewards for solving complex mathematical equations that enable transactions to go through.
However, one of the major problems that has come to light has been the presence of illicit material buried in the Bitcoin blockchain, linking it to the dark web.
Other blockchain platforms can offer things like smart contracts, which are automatically implemented when specific conditions from all interested parties are reached, cutting the time involved and the risk of mistakes. Another use could be storing medical records, as patients can be confident their information cannot be changed. The technology can also be used in supply chains, voting and has the potential to used for storing property records.
U19 WORLD CUP, WEST INDIES
UAE group fixtures (all in St Kitts)
- Saturday 15 January: UAE beat Canada by 49 runs
- Thursday 20 January: v England
- Saturday 22 January: v Bangladesh
UAE squad:
Alishan Sharafu (captain), Shival Bawa, Jash Giyanani, Sailles
Jaishankar, Nilansh Keswani, Aayan Khan, Punya Mehra, Ali Naseer, Ronak Panoly,
Dhruv Parashar, Vinayak Raghavan, Soorya Sathish, Aryansh Sharma, Adithya
Shetty, Kai Smith
Sole survivors
- Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
- George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
- Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
- Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
The specs: 2018 Maserati Levante S
Price, base / as tested: Dh409,000 / Dh467,000
Engine: 3.0-litre V6
Transmission: Eight-speed automatic
Power: 430hp @ 5,750rpm
Torque: 580Nm @ 4,500rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 10.9L / 100km
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Greatest of All Time
Starring: Vijay, Sneha, Prashanth, Prabhu Deva, Mohan
Lexus LX700h specs
Engine: 3.4-litre twin-turbo V6 plus supplementary electric motor
Power: 464hp at 5,200rpm
Torque: 790Nm from 2,000-3,600rpm
Transmission: 10-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 11.7L/100km
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh590,000
Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
- Priority access to new homes from participating developers
- Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
- Flexible payment plans from developers
- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
- DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
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Sri Lanka squad for tri-nation series
Angelo Mathews (c), Upul Tharanga, Danushka Gunathilaka, Kusal Mendis, Dinesh Chandimal, Kusal Janith Perera, Thisara Perera, Asela Gunaratne, Niroshan Dickwella, Suranga Lakmal, Nuwan Pradeep, Dushmantha Chameera, Shehan Madushanka, Akila Dananjaya, Lakshan Sandakan and Wanidu Hasaranga
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Gothia Cup 2025
4,872 matches
1,942 teams
116 pitches
76 nations
26 UAE teams
15 Lebanese teams
2 Kuwaiti teams
Ponti
Sharlene Teo, Pan Macmillan
The specs
- Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
- Power: 640hp
- Torque: 760nm
- On sale: 2026
- Price: Not announced yet
Our legal consultant
Name: Dr Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
The bio
Favourite book: The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
Favourite travel destination: Maldives and south of France
Favourite pastime: Family and friends, meditation, discovering new cuisines
Favourite Movie: Joker (2019). I didn’t like it while I was watching it but then afterwards I loved it. I loved the psychology behind it.
Favourite Author: My father for sure
Favourite Artist: Damien Hurst
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
