It started, as most of my terrible ideas do, with a glass of wine and an estate agent’s website I had no business looking at.
We were a few days into a February half term break in Dubai. The kids had been in the pool for approximately nine hours straight. My husband had gone a colour I would describe as “boiled prawn”. And I was lying on a sunlounger in 27 degrees thinking about the grey drizzle waiting for us at home.
“Imagine,” I said, “if we just had a place here.”
He did not answer, which I chose to interpret as enthusiasm.
Why Winter Sun Gets Under Your Skin
If you have ever done a winter holiday somewhere hot, you will know the feeling. You land, the doors open, and warm air hits you like a hug. Suddenly your shoulders drop about three inches.
Dubai is very good at that feeling, especially with kids. There are beaches with calm water, enormous malls with indoor everything for the one afternoon it is too hot, and more waterparks than any reasonable city needs.
Before you go anywhere, though, it is worth doing the boring grown-up bit. The government’s foreign travel advice pages cover entry requirements, local laws and safety for British travellers, and the UAE has rules that are genuinely different from home, so it is worth a read before you pack.
The city also works hard to make itself feel like a treat. Its own tourism board promotes places like the Gold Souk, where you can wander past shop windows full of gold and pretend you are just browsing. (We were just browsing. My purse remains unharmed.)
So yes, I can see exactly why people fall for it. The question is whether falling for somewhere on holiday is a good reason to buy a bit of it.
What Buying Property in Dubai From the UK Actually Involves
Here is where I did the thing I always do, which is go from idle daydream to eleven open browser tabs in about four minutes.
I wanted to see what was actually out there, so I had a proper nosy at developers selling to British buyers. Binghatti, one of the bigger Dubai developers, has a UK-facing site showing its top listed Dubai projects across areas like Business Bay, Jumeirah Village Circle and the district around the Burj Khalifa, and looking at Dubai property that way gave me a much clearer idea of what “a place here” might actually mean.
A few things surprised me.
First, a lot of what’s for sale is sold off-plan, which means buying before the building is finished. That is very different from buying a house in Lincolnshire that already has a roof, a kitchen and a slightly dodgy boiler.
Second, the areas vary enormously. The swanky postcode near the tallest building in the world is a completely different proposition from a newer family-focused neighbourhood a short drive out.
Third, some of the buildings are properly fancy, with designs linked to luxury car and jewellery brands. I spent a slightly embarrassing amount of time reading about those.
What I did not find was a magic answer to whether we should do it. That bit, annoyingly, requires thinking.
The Bit Nobody Mentions on the Sunlounger
Once the tan faded and we were back to school runs and packed lunches, I had a more sensible look at what owning abroad would really mean for a normal family.
It’s a long way away. A holiday home you can drive to is one thing. One that’s a seven-hour flight each way is another. Every visit costs flights for five, which adds up alarmingly fast.
Summer is not the same as winter. February in Dubai is gorgeous. July and August are a very different story, with heat that makes our summer look like a light breeze. So your “holiday home” might be a holiday home for part of the year only.
Someone has to look after it. Unless you’re there, you’re paying someone to manage it, clean it and deal with the air conditioning packing up.
Money gets complicated. Buying abroad involves currency, fees, service charges and tax questions on both ends. That’s a job for a proper accountant and a lawyer, not me and a glass of rosé.
The Residency Thing I Didn’t Know About
One genuinely interesting discovery was that Dubai links property ownership to long-term residency.
According to the Land Department, people who buy property worth AED 2 million or more can apply for a ten-year renewable residence permit, and they can sponsor their family too.
That explains why some families treat it as more than a holiday home. For people thinking about working abroad at some point, or splitting time between two countries, it could be a big deal.
There are strings attached, though, especially if you’re buying something not yet built. The Ministry of Economy says off-plan property can count towards that threshold, but only if it’s bought from companies approved by the relevant authority, and the buyer needs comprehensive health insurance.
In other words, it’s not something to decide on holiday, lying in the sun, feeling brave.
So, Would We?
Honestly? Not right now.
It isn’t that the idea is daft. For some families it makes a lot of sense, especially if you’d use it often, plan to spend real time there, or might move out for work one day.
For us, with three kids, school holidays to juggle and a bank account that flinches at the word “flights”, it’s a lovely daydream rather than a plan.
What I did take away was this: if you’re ever tempted, do your homework back home, not on the sunlounger. Have a proper look at developers and neighbourhoods, understand what you’d be buying, get real advice on money and law, and be honest about how often you’d actually go.
And maybe, like me, just book the next winter holiday instead. Somebody else can worry about the air conditioning.
Would you ever buy abroad, or is it a firm “holiday only” from you? I’d love to know if anyone’s actually done it.
This is just me being nosy, not financial or legal advice. Anyone seriously thinking about buying abroad should speak to qualified professionals first.