DOHA: The global financial crisis has had a positive impact on the real estate sector here as speculators are on the run and the market is getting back to the fundamentals, according to an expert.
During the recent real estate boom here, many speculators who were not professional developers entered the market, bought land and built housing stock, said Hesham Al Emadi, CEO of Energy City, Qatar.
And now that the market is stabilising in the aftermath of the global economic crisis, many of these buildings have become stress stocks, prompting the owners to exit. Established developers can, therefore, grab these stress assets either in straight buyouts or can offer them shares in these properties, Al Emadi said.
"Development is a difficult business and requires commitment and professionalism...The problem here and elsewhere has been that many speculators entered the market (during the recent boom) and now they don't know how to exit, but they need to."
He was speaking on 'New Fundamentals of Property Markets in Qatar and the Gulf' on the concluding day of Qatar Economic Forum yesterday. The other panelists included Avik Rakhit from Jones Lang LaSalle and Nazim Jaber, an architect from Saudi Arabia.
According to Al Emadi, the changes taking place in the marketplace post-recession will now reflect real demand as people have to go back to the fundamentals. This will favour investors.
The discussion was moderated by Sheikha Hanadi Nasser bin Khaled Al Thani, CEO of Al Waab City Real Estate Development Project. She said the crisis had not affected the real estate sector in the region as badly as it had done in other parts of the world, and Qatar remained the least affected among the GCC countries.
Rakhit said it was time for developers to focus on housing for middle-income users. They were ignored during the times of boom because land and construction costs were so high that creating affordable housing was very challenging. "This is one segment (middle-end housing) where demand is high and supplies are low," he said.
By Mobin Pandit
© The Peninsula 2009
