Dubai Property Report August 2026: Same-Homes Prices Drop

Same-homes prices dropped 5.17 percent across Dubai in August 2026. That measure compares identical home types over time, so changes in what sold cannot alter it. Meanwhile, the headline median price fell only 1.8 percent. The median is the middle price, with half of sales above it and half below.

The month at a glance

Same-homes prices compare this month against the same month last year for the same types and sizes of home, so a change in what sold cannot move them. Both comparison columns are measured on the same filtered population, so they are directly comparable.

apartments sold off plan were 58.2 percent of last year's value and account for 66.8 percent of the fall. Excluding them, value changed -36.2 percent.

Sales (left scale)Median price per square foot (right scale)

AugSepOctNovDecJanFebMarAprMayJunJulAug

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20252026

Show the figures behind this chart

Figures behind the chart: Sales a month, and the price per square foot

Month	Sales	Median price per square foot
Aug-25	17,073	AED 1,740
Sep-25	18,911	AED 1,717
Oct-25	18,216	AED 1,709
Nov-25	17,330	AED 1,767
Dec-25	17,732	AED 1,808
Jan-26	14,804	AED 1,813
Feb-26	14,820	AED 1,772
Mar-26	12,370	AED 1,757
Apr-26	12,072	AED 1,855
May-26	9,105	AED 1,688
Jun-26	11,936	AED 1,708
Jul-26	12,422	AED 1,711
Aug-26	10,852	AED 1,708

Dubai Land Department registrations. Figures for a closed month do not change after publication.

Same-homes prices fell 5.17 percent while headline medians slipped 1.8 percent

Show the figures behind this chart

Figures behind the chart: Headline against the same-homes measure

Measure	Change on the year
Headline median	-1.8%
Same homes, all	-5.17%
Same homes, excluding the leading contributor	-9.97%

Dubai Land Department registrations. Same-homes figures are already mix adjusted, so a change in what sold cannot move them.

Leases reach the register weeks after they begin, so the August count of 50316 is what had been registered and will rise. August stands at 84.8 percent of its prior year month, while settled months stand at 89.9 percent in May and 88.1 percent in April. Rent levels are medians of registered leases and are compared with August 2025, so registration lag does not distort them.

Moving in against staying put (same-homes, mix adjusted)

What a new tenant pays over a sitting one: 19.9% a year ago, 10.6% now.

• The headline median price per square foot fell 1.8 percent to AED 1,708. The price per square foot measures the cost of each unit of space to compare different homes.
• Prices for the same kinds of home fell 5.17 percent across all builders. Excluding the leading contributor, that decline steepened to 9.97 percent.

What might explain it. These are candidates, weighed against the month's own figures and dated reporting. They are not a finding, and we do not know which of them is right.

• Tourism and hospitality activity softened over the summer months. Lower visitor traffic trims short-stay earnings and cools buyer demand for lettable units. EVEN CHANCE, roughly 35 to 65 percent Source: US Federal Reserve, 2026-07-29. We would drop this if villa and family stock moved equally (tourism does not bid for 4-bedroom family homes).
• We checked short-let conversion as an explanation. This factor predicts lower sales alongside higher prices, which contradicts the recorded price drop. CHECKED, AND IT DOES NOT FIT, below 35 percent Source: Gulf News, 2026-07-29. We would drop this if short-let listing counts unchanged.

Sales dropped 36.4 percent as transacted value fell 45.6 percent

AugSepOctNovDecJanFebMarAprMayJunJulAug

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20252026

Show the figures behind this chart

Figures behind the chart: Off plan share of sales, by month

Month	Off plan share of sales
Aug-25	73.3%
Sep-25	74%
Oct-25	69.1%
Nov-25	70.9%
Dec-25	73.4%
Jan-26	69.6%
Feb-26	67.8%
Mar-26	74.8%
Apr-26	75.7%
May-26	73.8%
Jun-26	74.7%
Jul-26	71.2%
Aug-26	70.3%

Dubai Land Department registrations. Figures for a closed month do not change after publication.

• Total residential transactions fell 36.4 percent year on year to 10,852 sales. Year on year compares this month with August last year to remove seasonal shifts.
• Transacted value fell 45.6 percent to AED 22.02 billion. Apartments sold off plan accounted for 66.8 percent of that value drop. An off plan home is bought before construction finishes.

What might explain it. These are candidates, weighed against the month's own figures and dated reporting. They are not a finding, and we do not know which of them is right.

• Coverage tone and market discussion shifted across international news outlets. A shift in buyer attention reduces the pool of active buyers reviewing properties. EVEN CHANCE, roughly 35 to 65 percent Source: Gulf News, 2026-07-29. We would drop this if coverage volume flat.
• Some observers pointed to a rent-versus-buy crossover. That factor pushes prices upward, which contradicts the downturn registered this month. CHECKED, AND IT DOES NOT FIT, below 35 percent Source: Dubai Media Office, 2026-05-22. We would drop this if rents rose alongside purchases (a conversion should relieve rental demand).

Villa prices rose 2.3 percent while apartment prices fell 4.8 percent

Sales (left scale)Value transacted (right scale)

AugSepOctNovDecJanFebMarAprMayJunJulAug

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20252026

Show the figures behind this chart

Figures behind the chart: Sales a month, and the value transacted

Month	Sales	Value transacted
Aug-25	17,073	AED 40.49bn
Sep-25	18,911	AED 44.51bn
Oct-25	18,216	AED 45.27bn
Nov-25	17,330	AED 44.01bn
Dec-25	17,732	AED 44.73bn
Jan-26	14,804	AED 42.55bn
Feb-26	14,820	AED 40.57bn
Mar-26	12,370	AED 32.27bn
Apr-26	12,072	AED 34.94bn
May-26	9,105	AED 20.71bn
Jun-26	11,936	AED 23.52bn
Jul-26	12,422	AED 24.11bn
Aug-26	10,852	AED 22.02bn

Dubai Land Department registrations. Figures for a closed month do not change after publication.

• Apartment prices fell 4.8 percent to AED 1,718 per square foot across 9,727 sales. Villa prices gained 2.3 percent to AED 1,578 across 1,125 sales.

What might explain it. These are candidates, weighed against the month's own figures and dated reporting. They are not a finding, and we do not know which of them is right.

• Families often schedule property purchases around the start of the academic year. That timing concentrates buyer competition into larger family villas. EVEN CHANCE, roughly 35 to 65 percent Source: Gulf News, 2026-07-29. We would drop this if studios and one-bedrooms moved equally.
• Short-hold buying for resale was concentrated in smaller apartment units. When short-term flipping slows, price support in those smaller segments quickly weakens. EVEN CHANCE, roughly 35 to 65 percent Source: Gulf News, 2026-07-29. We would drop this if short-hold resale share unchanged.

New lease rents dropped 10.14 percent while renewal rents rose

380,252 apartment units are registered and not yet finished, at 18% average build progress.

• Total registered tenancy contracts fell 15.2 percent year on year to 50,316 leases. Contracts signed by new tenants rose 0.4 percent to 24,502.
• On the same-homes measure, rents for new leases fell 10.14 percent. Rents for renewed contracts rose 3.61 percent over the same period.

What might explain it. These are candidates, weighed against the month's own figures and dated reporting. They are not a finding, and we do not know which of them is right.

• Market rents for open homes adjust quickly to tenant choices. New tenants negotiate lower rates as delivered units expand available rental options. EVEN CHANCE, roughly 35 to 65 percent Source: Gulf News, 2026-07-29. We would drop this if yields moved materially, which means the multiple moved and not the cash flow (that is RNT-02).
• Gross yields shifted as rental movements diverged from home prices. Gross yield measures yearly rent divided by purchase price before any ownership costs. EVEN CHANCE, roughly 35 to 65 percent Source: Gulf News, 2026-07-29. We would drop this if rents moved by as much as prices (then it is RNT-01).

The largest sales of the month

The largest residential sales the register recorded in the month. Project and community are printed as the register holds them. No sale is left out for being unusual, and price divided by size gives the last column, so any row can be checked against itself.

The rest of the register

The figures above cover apartments and villas. The register also records offices, shops, hotel apartments and land, and the leases signed on commercial space.

These medians rest on a few hundred deals rather than the many thousands behind the residential figures, so a large move in price per square foot can reflect what happened to sell. The counts and the total value are the firmer figures. Land is reported by count and value only: a plot's rate depends on what may be built on it, which the register does not record.

The figures in full

Apartment communities (built area)

Villa communities (plot area, not comparable with apartments)

What this month changes, by who you are

Developer

• Off plan sales accounted for 70.3 percent of all deals. Their value share reached only 57.7 percent as buyers selected smaller units.
• The leading contributor captured 33.1 percent of all sales. Smaller builders faced stiffer competition for the remaining transactions.

Investor

• Rents for new leases fell 10.14 percent for identical homes. Renewal rents rose 3.61 percent, altering projected returns between new and continuing tenancies.
• Villa prices rose 2.3 percent to AED 1,578 per square foot. Apartment prices fell 4.8 percent to AED 1,718 per square foot.

Analyst

• Same-homes prices dropped 5.17 percent across the market. Excluding the top contributor, the decline reached 9.97 percent.
• Off plan apartments accounted for 66.8 percent of the total value decline. Excluding that segment, transacted value fell 36.2 percent instead of 45.6 percent.

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How we read this month

Before this report offers any reason for a move, it runs four checks against the month's own figures. Each one can end the question, and when one does we say so instead of reaching for a story.

• Ramadan did not distort the comparison with last year. August 2026 carried a similar share of Ramadan in both years, so the comparison with last year is not distorted by it.
• Part of the change against last month is the number of open days. The month had 21 working days against 23 the month before. About 8.7 percent of any change in the raw count is the calendar rather than the market.
• A larger move than usual. Sales fell 12.6 percent against the month before. That is the fifth largest largest change in the last 1 years, so it is worth asking what sat behind it.

What we could not check this month.

• The month does not carry both a raw price change and a same-homes price change, so how much of the move was a change in what sold cannot be measured. Nothing here claims it was small.
• The month does not carry a largest-contributor share, so how concentrated it was cannot be stated.

Explanations we checked and rejected. We weighed 40 candidate explanations against this month's figures. 4 did not fit, and these are the 2 a reader is most likely to have already had in mind.

• Short-let conversion. This factor should have left volume down, price up. What actually happened was volume down, price down. The shape is wrong, which counts against it more heavily than a missing piece of supporting evidence would.
• Rent-versus-buy crossover. This factor pushes up and the market went the other way. That is evidence against it.

Candidate explanations are scored against our published factor library, version 1.0.0. Each one is checked for whether it happened early enough to matter, whether it pushes the way the market moved, whether it reached the parts of the market it should have, whether it is large enough to account for the move, and how many other things fit just as well. A factor that fails the first of those is never offered at all.

Method and limits

Coverage. Residential figures include completed and off plan transactions recorded by the Dubai Land Department. Commercial real estate and industrial properties are excluded from these figures. Land transactions are excluded because registry filings do not provide consistent area measurements.

Prices. Extreme pricing outliers are excluded from rate calculations but remain within overall transaction counts. Communities require a minimum number of sales before we publish a price. Apartment prices use built area while villa prices use plot area, so the two never compare. Like for like (comparing the same things) is the industry term for this same-homes measure.

Rentals. Leases reach the register weeks after starting, so the August count of 50,316 contracts will rise over time. August registrations stood at 84.8 percent of the completed prior year total, which overstates the drop in volume. Published rent levels represent the middle rent, with half of contracts above and half below.

Attribution. Registry records without a recorded bedroom count dropped to 4.8 percent from 7.3 percent last year. All bedroom size band shares are calculated using tagged transactions only.

Off plan. Off plan resales register in the same format as initial developer sales, so reported totals combine both. Registry figures for closed months remain fixed after publication to preserve historical consistency.

Beyond residential. The headline figures cover apartments and villas only. Offices, shops, hotel apartments and land are reported separately, in their own section, and are never mixed into the residential figures or the price measures drawn from them.

The largest sales. Listed as the register recorded them. No sale is left out for being unusual, so one may sit outside the price statistics above, which exclude statistical outliers to protect a median. Project and community print as the register holds them rather than by a name resolved from anywhere else, and price, size and price per square foot are all shown so any row can be checked against itself.

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Every figure in this review is drawn from Dubai Land Department registrations and checked mechanically before publication. Figures for a closed month do not change after publication.