Morning Roundup: "A Fannie Mae for the UAE?"

It would seem, giving the mess that the US has made of its housing industry, that a good rule of thumb would be to avoid doing whatever it is they did. But the UAE is facing a liquidity problem, and one idea that's been swirling around the UAE developers is to create something similar to the US's government-backed securitizations entities, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, writes Bradley Hope in The National. We say fine, but please think of less cute names for them. It always felt awkward watching the American politicians beating up some poor girl named Fannie.

The property developer bribery trials kicked off yesterday. The National's Hani M Bathish reports that lawyers from seven former property executives -- who worked for major developers including Sama Dubai, Damac and Nakheel -- accused of taking bribes and illegal commissions claimed that there was nothing in UAE law that prohibited what their clients had done.

And there is some good news for Abu Dhabi's housing crunch in the long term, if not the short term. The Abu Dhabi Urban Planning Council announced plans to create 50,000 more homes for Emiratis over the next 20 years, report Tala al Ramahi and Nathalie Gillet of The National.

Meanwhile, Dubai's crackdown on villa sharing continues, reports The National's Praveen Menon, with over 4,000 villa shares broken up and more to come.

Gulf News' Suzanne Fenton reports that property experts have been seeing a shift towards rentals and buying in community development areas, such as Discovery Gardens and Dubai Marina over the last two months. Emirates Business 24/7 has a similar story from Reuters about the shift toward "new Dubai."

The Saudi property market is expected to stay strong despite the global crisis, according to Dr Abdullah M Bin Mahfouz, vice chairman of the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry, reports Joanna Hartley in Arabian Business.