Rents in Sharjah as set to continue dropping in 2016 after experiencing an 8.3 per cent year-on-year fall in the first quarter of 2016, according to Cluttons.
The property consultancy said rents over the three-month period dropped by 5.7 per cent, fuelled mainly by rapidly-declining villa rents. Average villa rents have dropped by 13.2 per cent, while average apartment rents are 1.5 per cent lower.
Cluttons said that weaker conditions in the Sharjah market are likely to continue as the year progresses, with average rental falls of between 3 and 5 per cent predicted.
Faisal Durrani, the head of research at Cluttons, said: “Rents across Sharjah’s more affordable areas remain linked to the performance of Dubai’s rental market. With a weak short-term outlook for Dubai, we do not expect to see any turn around in rental value growth until jobs linked to the World Expo in 2020 start to materialise, which we should start to see in the next 12 to 18 months.
“Until then, the rental market in Sharjah is expected to remain subdued.”
Cluttons said that demand for gated communities remains strong, citing both Majid Al Futtaim’s Al Zahia and the Dh2.4bn Tilal City project as examples.
It said that these units remain affordable when compared with Dubai, with three-bed villas typically commanding rents of Dh90,000 per year, compared with between Dh120,000-Dh340,000 in Dubai communities.
mfahy@thenational.ae
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