MAG Property Developments will this week launch a new 4 billion UAE dirham ($1.0884 billion) gated community project within Mohammed Bin Rashid City, containing more than 4,500 homes aimed at the mid-income segment of the market. The Dubai-based company's chief executive, Talal Al Gaddah, said that MAG Eye will comprise 4,000 new, low-rise apartments and 535 townhouses and is scheduled for completion by the first half of 2022.

"We just bought it (the plot) in January this year," he told Zawya at an interview in the company's offices last Tuesday. "We are in the process of developing a lot of towers... So we said no more towers. We develop what we need, and we will start to develop communities and low-lying developments.

He said that low-rise residential communities "are more healthy for the company and the end-user".

"If you start a tower, you need to complete it. But if you are building a community with 20, 30 or 40 buildings, you will build what is needed."

Al Gaddah also said that the company is creating a new division, known as MAG Of Value, which will look to develop more than 10,000 apartments over the next five years that will offer "medium price, [but] high-end quality".

"We don't want to go to the market and call it affordable,” he said, adding that very often investors associate affordable with low quality.

The company will also launch a new tower project at Jumeirah Lakes Towers at Cityscape - a 472-unit, 40-storey tower in Jumeirah Lakes Towers known as MBL Residence. This will have a value of 615 million UAE dirhams and will be built in the same cluster as sister company Invest Group Overseas' newly-announced IGO 101 tower.

The projects will be part of a portfolio of more than 8 billion UAE dirhams worth of development which the company has announced within the past 12 months that it will display at Cityscape, with other schemes including the 439-unit, 500 million UAE dirham MAG 318 residential tower in Business Bay and the 595-unit MAG 230 tower in City of Arabia, which were both announced in May, as well as the 2.4 billion UAE dirham MAG Creek wellness resort unveiled at the end of last year.

This resort will contain a 120,000 square foot Worldcare Wellness Centre and a hotel for which an operator has not yet been appointed to run. The gated community will also contain 17 wellness mansions, 75 wellness-focussed homes and 172 holiday homes, as well as the 96-room hotel. MAG PD will seek certification from the US-based Wellness Institute for the development.

"We said we need to do something different, because today there is two markets for Dubai. Either you develop a project for which there is no benchmark in Dubai, or you develop for the medium class."

© Zawya 2017