Did you know that one-third of the world's population lives within a 4-hour flight and two thirds within a nine-hour flight from Dubai?

When I arrived here to live and work in 2003, I joined 1,014,379 registered Dubai residents

On 1 November 2017 according to the Dubai Statistics Centre (Government of Dubai), I am now one of the 2,872,252 residents, and the city is on track to reach 3.4m in 2020 and a staggering 5.2m in 2030, hopefully, I will still be here.

Did you know that 80 percent of the Dubai population live in rented accommodation - apparently that makes Dubai one of the largest rental marketplaces in the world? 

Did you also know that Dubai tenants sign12-month tenancy contracts and pay in advance for the entire year via one to four post-dated cheques?

My clients are almost all British or European, either living and working in their home country or as ex-pats across the world. They tend to own more than one property at home and are choosing to invest in Dubai to diversify their portfolios, they are attracted by the lower prices and higher yields from tax-free Buy to Lets and want to escape the increasingly restrictive rental and mortgage regulations in their home countries.

And now Dubai is "The most active city in the world".

Everyone here is talking about the Dubai Fitness Challenge, and the countdown is now on. Citizens, residents and tourists are encouraged to engage in physical fitness activity by HH Sheikh Hamdan who is asking everyone to commit to 30 minutes of daily exercise, for just 30 days, starting Friday 20th October. 

Naturally, I would say that it is imperative that you speak with a knowledgeable and trustworthy Dubai based Real Estate Agent when making a property investment in this city.

Please contact me if you ever need a recommendation for such an agent.

This week, we learned that Dubai had retained its ranking as the fourth most popular travel destination in the world, according to the ninth annual Mastercard Global Destinations Cities Index. The emirate welcomed 14.87 million international overnight visitors in 2016, with an expected continued growth of 7.7 percent for 2017.

The Cityscape property exhibiiton ended on Wednesday and it was one of the busiest and more enjoyable that I have attended for a good number of years. I saw a brief article in The National that echoes my impressions of the show and current thoughts on the market, read it here

This is a big week in the world of Dubai property, the Cityscape Global exhibition opens its doors on the 11th coinciding with the end to the holidays plus the return en-mass for those who escaped the summer heat. 

Dubai is constantly evolving, growing and improving and anyone that is a regular visitor is often amazed at the changes that have occurred since their previous visit even if it was last month, never mind if it was last year.

Its been a fairly hectic couple of weeks with no obvious seasonal slow down. 

I have already had a few clients visiting from Europe since the schools broke for the long break and they have taken advantage of the creative offers which many of the developers are coming up with to attract buyers whilst the summer heat is on full blast. 

Emaar and Nshama started it and now almost all the other developers have followed up with special offers for Ramadan making this June an even greater "buyers market" for off-plan property.

Emaar gave us an offer for one day only where they covered the 4% registration fee combined with a payment plan of 40% over two years post handover, they extended for a few more days but now they are back to normal though I suspect another offer day before Eid al-Fitr which is expected on or before the 24th June.

Traditionally this is the time of year when many ex-pats leave for their annual holidays as business tends to slow down during Ramadan due to the shorter working days. 

However in the last two or three years it has become one of the busiest times of the year for me as many of my overseas clients take advantage of the hotel and flight deals on offer as well a chance to enjoy a more traditional Ramadan experience.