The lifting of the more than three years of unwarranted blockade on Qatar by it’s Gulf neighbors is indeed a sigh of relief for the business community, and the return of the status quo between the country and it’s vital allies in the Gulf will no doubt lead to better economic development in the coming months.
However, the benefits of such positive development will not immediately affect the real estate industry though it is inevitably forthcoming, according to the Chairman of the Association of Filipino & Entrepreneur Executives in Qatar (AFREEQ), Joseph Timothy Rivera (pictured).
In a statement, Rivera refuted speculations that property prices would now go up due to recent events starting with the reopening of the Qatar-KSA border.
He said any improvement in the Qatar property market will not happen overnight and will take a considerable amount of time.
“The reopening of borders and flights are just the beginning of the process. The resumption of trade and commerce, as well as the physical re-establishment of diplomatic relations between Qatar and the former siege nations, is daunting but we remain optimistic that this would all fall into place in a smooth and hopefully speedy manner,” he added.
Although short-term rentals have started increasing prices with some British-managed companies having 95 percent occupancy rates, Rivera is confident on the country’s resilience and that local realtors would soon be attending to more new relocating tenants again to the country in the coming months after the first quarter of this year as compared to the mostly downgrading or just lateral-moving tenants as experienced by the leasing industry for the past two years.
On the other hand, any improvement towards the ending of the pandemic would actually improve the market faster than the recent ending of the blockade as the COVID-19 pandemic remains to be a key factor in the real estate market.
“Our western industry colleagues agree on our assessment though some of them feel that any improvement in the market soon may start from property sales first to be followed by residential and commercial rentals. In fact, some of our Arab counterparts even predict conservatively that any improvement of the market would most likely happen towards the end of the year,” added Rivera.
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