My Own Home: Travel agent’s Dh1 million Al Hamra Village townhouse doubles in value in two years

Ania Bruno plans to build a new level to accommodate her family of four

Al Hamra Village is a housing development in Ras Al Khaimah popular with expatriates. All photos: Antonie Robertson / The National

Ania Bruno lives in a three-bedroom townhouse with her husband and two children in Al Hamra Village

Ms Bruno describes her interior decor style as 'rustic and boho'

The owners opt for more neutral aesthetics

One of the children's rooms

They have semi-renovated the kitchen.

They converted a second living room into another bedroom

Ms Bruno chooses only wooden furniture

A balcony

The patio

My Own Home takes you inside a reader-owned property to ask how much they paid, why they decided to buy and what they have done with it since moving in

Polish entrepreneur Ania Bruno, co-owner of tour operator Adventurous Camel, has been living in the UAE on and off since 2009 but decided to settle here after buying a property in Ras Al Khaimah in 2022.

Ms Bruno lives in a three-bedroom townhouse in Al Hamra Village with her husband and two children, having moved to the emirate from Abu Dhabi in 2020.

While they've historically moved country or city every two-and-a-half years, Ms Bruno says they're happy to settle in Ras Al Khaimah, and even plan on adding an extra floor to their new home.

The National has a look around.

Please tell us about your home

It’s a three/four-bedroom townhouse because, on the first floor, we have a second lounge that we’ve turned into a bedroom. We have a single garage and a sizeable garden.

When did you buy the house?

We bought it two years ago initially as an investment. We never planned to move into it. We have a few investment properties in Al Hamra Village, and then a year-and-a-half ago we decided that we couldn’t stand our landlord.

We were renting a much bigger property and the prices of rent started going really high, so we decided to downsize and move into our own home.

We took the summer to renovate and then moved in October.

How much did you buy it for?

We bought it for Dh1,050,000 when everything was very, very low. Now it’s worth about Dh2.3 million.

Al Hamra Village is 5km away from the casino and it’s the first housing development, and everything else that’s planned in the area is apartments, so it will continue to go up.

People like to buy older properties so that once they’re renovated, they’ve got bigger rooms and bigger gardens when you compare them to everything that gets built now.

What renovations have you done?

We’ve renovated the three bathrooms. We moved a window in the kitchen so it was in the middle and gave lots of light. We also moved the sink, changed the worktops and tiles, and painted it. So we semi-renovated the kitchen – it’s not where I want it to be yet.

Ania Bruno prioritised renovating their kitchen. Antonie Robertson / The National

We also extended the patio in the garden and built a pergola. We closed the garage and built a mezzanine in the garage for storage.

Now we’re planning on extending it up and building a third floor. At the moment, our first floor has the kitchen, bathroom, living and dining rooms, then the second floor has all the bedrooms and bathrooms – now we want to build another floor. It’s cheaper than buying a bigger house.

We’ve spent about Dh150,000 on renovations so far.

How would you describe your interior design style?

I like rustic and boho, and I don’t like things that are not made out of wood, but with the renovations, we went for something slightly neutral that appeals to most people. I always think about if we rent it or sell it, we don’t want to go for anything that will put people off.

The only statement thing we have is in the downstairs bathroom, I put jungle wallpaper. I just wanted it to pop a bit.

Why did you choose this neighbourhood?

When we were moving to RAK, we only had two options – either Al Hamra Village or Mina Al Arab. Mina is newer, but the quality of the build within the houses is slightly worse – and the area is dead.

Al Hamra Village is popular with families moving to Ras Al Khaimah. Antonie Robertson / The National

We live in a very, very small village in RAK and everybody knows everybody. I’m more of a city girl, so I wanted to see people. We’d been here for a week and had gone to both places at different times to see what was happening around the areas, and Mina was just so quiet.

I also prefer the layout of the homes. So, in the end, we chose the place where people go outside and use the pools. There’s also a mall next door and there’s a primary school based in the village.

How long do you plan to live in this house?

That's a tricky question, because we are one of those families that changes country, or at least a town, every maybe two-and-a-half years on average. But now I don't think we're going anywhere. I think we're done.

Now we're running the business, and it's growing and we base it on Ras Al Khaimah because it's a very unknown emirate and it's nice. There are a lot of people coming here who are being sold a holiday to Dubai. It’s not Dubai, so we're trying to educate them.

You never know, we're always open to moving, but we are happy. Every time I have to drive to Dubai, it's just too busy and I’ve got so lazy that driving somewhere for 20 minutes is too far.