DOHA - Developers in Bahrain are awaiting the completion of the upcoming Doha-Manama causeway in 2013 to see a real estate boom as demand for property for foreigners is likely to surge.
Developers in Manama are mostly focusing on affordable housing and currently on offer are apartments of a minimum of 77 square metres with prices beginning from a low of QR7,000 per square metre.
Middle-income expatriates from Qatar can hope to buy apartments in Bahrain for investment or their personal use as the prices of residential units range from as low as QR500,000, with banks there offering long-term soft mortgage loans.
There are currently 15 to 20 high-rise residential towers being built in Bahrain, where apartments are sold on freehold basis and residency visas are issued for 99 years in one go unless an owner sells off or transfers a property.
One can also work and do business in Bahrain if one has a 99-year residency visa, said a developer who was here to take part in the mega real estate exposition held at the Qatar International Exhibition Center.
Jamal Al Issa, Vice-President of MJM Group, a Kuwaiti investment company which is developing residential property for foreigners in Bahrain, told this newspaper yesterday that his focus was on middle-income users, among them long-time expatriates from Qatar and other GCC states.
Sounding excited about the upcoming Manama-Doha causeway, he said he hoped a lot of Indians, Britons, Pakistanis and even Americans based in Qatar and other GCC countries would like to buy properties in Bahrain once the causeway opens in 2013.
Bahrain is a free country and the prices are affordable, the developer said. Banks there are providing long-term mortgage loans for up to 80 percent of the value of a property depending on the bank statements and credibility of the buyer.
Expatriates in Qatar can seek mortgage loans for properties in Bahrain as well. "In our first phase, we are building 253 apartments, some 85 percent of which are already sold off," said Al Issa.
The maximum price per square metre in his project is equivalent to QR9,000, he said, as opposed to average prices of properties for foreigners here starting from around QR15,000 per square metres.
The apartments in the first phase of the MJM project will be ready for occupancy by early 2012 and then the title deeds will be handed to owners.
By Mobin Pandit
© The Peninsula 2009
