A tourists takes a photograph as she walks along Dubai Marina Walk. AP

Demand is running red- hot in Dubai’s real estate market, catapulting glitzy properties to record-breaking valuations.

Not even the flooding in April could dampen the bull market. State-backed Emaar Properties, whose name is splashed across Dubai’s skyline, announced that its development business made $8.1 billion in sales through the first half of the year, up from $5.2 billion over the same time period last year.

Across the city, valuations for Dubai’s upscale villas have set a new record, increasing around 38% in the second quarter of 2024 compared to last year, according to real estate consultancy ValuStrat.

The average price for a villa – the local term for any freestanding home - exceeded $2.7 million for the first time in a decade. Rises in premium apartments are close behind with locations in Palm Jumeirah, a man-made archipelago jutting out into the Arabian Sea, already surpassing 2014 peaks.

Tariq Shah, the head of sales at Pat & Co., a brokerage firm that deals in high-end properties, said the demand from his clientele seeking to buy has risen exponentially. "The demand for luxury is way above the expectation,” Shah told the AP.

Meanwhile, Dubai International Airport – the world’s busiest for international travel – saw a record 44.9 million travellers in the first half of this year. Dubai plans to move operations to a nearly $35 billion new airport in the next decade.

Spectacular footfall "We are heading for a forecast number for the balance of the year of 91.8 million passengers through DXB, which is again another record for us,” Dubai Airports CEO Paul Griffiths told the AP.

Some 9.3 million tourists visited the global hub through the first half of the year, beating pre-pandemic heights, according to research from the Dubai government-owned bank Emirates NBD.

The city state’s population has grown from 3.2 million in 2018 to nearly 3.7 million in 2024, with an additional 1.1 million who temporarily live in the city or commute there for work each day.

Dubai seeks to increase its population to 5.8 million by 2040. Developers have already completed over 6,000 housing units through the first half of the year, and are expected to finish building another 20,000 by the end of the year, according to the state-run WAM news agency. "They are big numbers, but they’re being absorbed,” said Property Monitor's Jochinke. "People are buying them.”

Associated Press