Beware: Heavy penalties for fake property listings in Dubai
Dubai Land Department fines 256 brokers for failing advertising rules over six months
Dubai: Dubai has warned online property portal against ‘fake’ and 'multiple' property listings in a bid to lure customers.
After a crackdown on fake listings of properties for sale, Dubai has also warned agents against fake listing of rental properties.
Dubai Land Department has fined 256 brokers for failing advertising rules over the first six months since the rule was launched.
Earlier this year, Dubai Land Department and RERA set out clear rules on the steps estate agents must take before advertising a property for sale online. This applies to off-plan and ready homes alike.
How it works
This meant brokers had to fill up forms and, most important, there was strict limits on how many estate agents can advertise or list the same property online. Within days of the new rules being implemented, there was a drastic drop in listings across online channels featuring Dubai property for sale.
Gone for good were instances of the same property featuring multiple asking prices, which were put up based on brokers’ whims. (In the past all that they needed were approvals from the developer concerned to advertise/list their property.)
This adds up to is less distortion in the Dubai property market - and leading to better experience for buyers and sellers. It leads to fewer situations of a potential buyer being misled by faulty online ads of a property they might have plans to buy, Gulf News reported.
Heavy fines
The penalties for not getting it right are heavy - Dh50,000 in fines and double that for repeat violations.
In the recent past, Dubai Land Department has issued statements talking about penalties being imposed on agencies for various acts of omission in following the rules and processes.
Apart from getting proper clearance from DLD before advertising a property, the concerned brokers have another task to fulfil if they manage to sell it. That is ensure any listing of that particular property online gets taken down within 90 days of the sale transaction.
Online property portals
While Dubai real estate agents need to be extra careful in complying with the rules, online property portals too are feeling the impact. A drastic reduction in multiple listings means loss of revenue for online portals.
“The top two or three leading property portals can possibly absorb the impact, because the Dubai property sales market is still growing month-on-month,” said an agent. “But for any other portal, it will be difficult to remain a viable entity.”
There is already talk of a portal ceasing operations, and costing its promoters significant losses.
Consolidation
As multiple/fake property sale listings drop drastically, there has been some consolidation among property portals in the country. The sentiment is that while leading portals can absorb most of their drop in web traffic, new or those with lesser traffic will find the going extremely tough.
With the number of property listings coming down, it has meant a drop in web traffic for the concerned property portals. To counter, some of them have raised their tariffs on listings.