DOHA: With the real estate sector in many Gulf countries having been hard hit by the global economic crunch, holding an exhibition dedicated to the sector could be a real challenge.
But Nidal Ali Halabi, General Manager of Trance Continent, the organisers of the event, is upbeat about over 100 real estate companies from Arab and other countries to participate in the event. Workers giving final touches to one of the stalls participating in the Q-Rex 2009.
With 15,000sqm of display space, the 4th Qatar International Real Estate and Investment Exhibition (Q-Rex 2009) is much larger than the previous 10,000sqm Q-Rex with many exhibitors having booked larger areas to set up specially designed pavilions instead of the usual stands.
Halabi said Q-Rex 2009 has attracted immense interest from developers and other real estate stake holders as it would provide them with an opportunity to get acquainted with the Qatari real estate sector's development level.
Q-Rex 2009 to be held from today till Thursday at the Qatar International Exhibition Centre has attracted a number of major local and regional real estate developers, Halabi told The Peninsula yesterday.
"This year we have major real estate developers such as Doha Land and Retaj which are in their first participation in Q-Rex," he said.
He added that the event will witness the participation of real estate companies from across the GCC and also from Cyprus, Germany and Syria. Besides, prominent visitors from the GCC, Europe, US including chambers of commerce have been invited to attend the event.
The Q-Rex edition 2008 attracted over 25,000 visitors in four days and this year Halabi predicts the event will attract even more visitors because of the many new projects coming up in Qatar.
The Retaj Marketing and Project Management Company, a shareholding semi-governmental 100 percent Qatari-owned company is one of the new participants in the Q-Rex and is intent to make the most of the event.
"This is our first participation in Q-Rex and we are looking to expand from this international event. And we are looking to go global with visits to Russia, UK trying to market our projects just after the exhibition," said Mohammed Nofal, Marketting Manager at Retaj.
The company will focus its main activities at Q-Rex 2009 around its flagship project in The Pearl Qatar where it had received the right to market and sell housing units in the Qanat Quartier. Besides, Retaj will be making many offers at the event such as free risk investment, a first in Qatar. Nofal also said the company will announce a major multipurpose project worth QR3bn that the company will be undertaking at the heart of Doha when Q-Rex 2009 concludes.
By Nasser Al Harthy
© The Peninsula 2009
