Festival City to get more residential units
Al Futtaim encouraged by buoyant market conditions to build more residential units on the 1,300 acre development
Dubai-based Al-Futtaim Group has announced plans to build more residential units in its 1,300-acre Dubai Festival City (DFC) development, encouraged by improved property market conditions pushing prices back up to 2007 levels.
Ian Plumley, the general manager of property sales at the mixed-use development, said prices had recovered and that demand was strong for villas and townhomes.
“We’re at about $354 a square foot,” Plumley told the Gulf News. “I think we’re probably at late 2007 with villas and townhouses…I’m talking about when we had a sensible market on the rise.”
Next year, Al Futtaim is planning to sell some existing residential property that it had been leasing directly to tenants, as part of a pickup in activity after the company decided to slow down in the wake of the global financial crisis, Plumley said.
“Slowly, we want to take the master plan and develop it over the next 10 or 15 years,” he said. “We’re just now signing off on the next five years, which will bring us about 500 or 600 units more.”
Festival City comprises a shopping centre of 185,806 m2, surrounded by offices, residential buildings and a golf course.
