Indians biggest foreign property buyers in Dubai again

New Delhi: Indians invested  Rs 42,000 crore between January 2016 to June 2017 to buy immovable properties in Dubai, thus becoming biggest foreign property buyers in the Emirates again..

According to the Dubai Land Department, the property purchase has seen an increase of Rs 12,000 crore from 2014.

In yet another report, the Dubai Land Department had last month said that etween December 2015 and June 2017, overseas investors put up as much as 41 billion to purchase property in the Emirates.

Indians topped the list of foreign investors with USD 5.6 billion, followed by Saudis who pumped in USD 3.4 billion.

Sales of properties in Dubai rose rapidly in the years after the market was opened to foreigners in 2002.

Prices soared as investors piled in, but when the global financial crisis hit the debt-laden emirate in 2009, it sent them into free-fall.

A recovery led by tourism, trade and transportation pushed prices up again between 2012 and 2014.

But in 2014, a glut in oil production slapped down the price of crude, hitting the Gulf economies that underpin Dubai's real estate sector.

Prices for homes in Dubai have since dropped by over 15 per cent and rents have fallen even more.

Earlier this month, a report by Knight Frank India and the International Real Estate Expo (IREX)  said that most Indians buy homes abroad for investment purposes followed by the aspiration of having a second home.

Sixty-three percent of the resident Indian buyers preferred compact apartments of less than 1,500 sq ft.

The report said that property overseas became affordable in 2016-17 due to strengthening of the rupee compared to the previous fiscal, when buyers had invested USD 88.4 million.

Approximately 77 percent of the Indian buyers prefer a property that is less than USD 1 million, the report said.