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Bloomberg

Dubai is adding a new round of ostentatious mansions and penthouses – some fitted with cinemas, spas and private lifts – as developers in the United Arab Emirates city court multimillionaires from around the world.
These ultra-luxury homes are being priced anywhere from US$60 million to more than US$120 million as house-hunters from Europe, Asia and the Americas swoop in.
The trappings are increasingly extravagant, even by the standards of an emirate renowned for its love of glitz.
One builder transported a giant glass wall thousands of kilometres to give the owner his chosen sea view.
Another designed a private lobby and lift for the buyer of a penthouse so big that it straddles two towers.
Yet another created a movable floor for a client’s swimming pool that rises to meld with the garden tiles during parties.

Prices across Dubai’s booming property market are moderating after surging since 2021. But that is not stopping builders from adding palatial new homes along the city’s priciest beachfront locations.
“The upper end of the market is the most profitable,” said Mark Phoenix, chief executive officer of Sankari Properties, whose company is building a US$1 billion ultra-luxury tower. “If done properly, a developer can sell for the maximum sort of prices.”
Dubai’s market is bucking a global trend as prime residential prices slow or drop in many other international markets.
In 2024, 435 homes valued at more than US$10 million each were sold in Dubai, reaching a record and surpassing New York and Hong Kong, according to Knight Frank.
The property adviser estimates that ultra-luxury prices will jump at least another 5 per cent this year in the emirate after surging about 67 per cent since 2021.

Wealthy families shopping globally for second and third homes can still find more space for the same buck in Dubai. On a per-square-foot basis, prices in the emirate are a third of New York’s and a fifth of London’s, according to Mahdi Amjad, founder of Omniyat, a developer of ultra-luxury flats.
“We benchmark our buildings against buildings in New York and we find that for similar ticket prices, or maybe lower ticket prices, you get by far more space and by far more experiences and amenities,” said Amjad, who expects to add another 100 ultra-luxury homes this year.
Dubai’s builders are often forced to go to extraordinary lengths to compete with international cities.
On a recent visit to a construction site, a giant glass dome could be seen being built in the centre of a mansion. It was meant to cover a pool and spa and could be retracted when the owners wanted to sun themselves.
Elsewhere, there are winding pools to allow residents to swim from the bar to the spa at the other end of the garden.
Most of our clients have multiple homes in cities across the world and they’re very specific about what they like and what they expect
Wissam Damaa, founder, Palace Group
Dubai’s artificial man-made islands are favoured locations. The mansions on Dubai’s seahorse-shaped island, known as Billionaire Island, usually come with private beaches and rotating tables for parking that automatically turn cars in the right direction.
Wealth advisory firm Henley & Partners estimated that 6,700 millionaires would come to the United Arab Emirates in 2024, surpassing all other countries.
But catering to the whims of the global rich is not cheap – or easy.
Adding extravagant amenities means “it costs you a lot more to build with upfront costs for design. That’s where a lot of developers get scared,” Phoenix said.

Wissam Damaa, founder of property developer Palace Group, had a buyer who wanted an entire wall of his sprawling living room made with a single pane of glass. At 17 metres by 4 metres (56 feet by 13 feet), it was the size of some swimming pools.
Damaa was not sure he could find an individual pane that size, let alone install it. And the buyer wanted the glass wall to disappear completely at the click of a button for an open sea view.
When Damaa contacted one of the largest glass manufacturers in Germany, the company took 45 days to decide if it could meet the specifications. It ultimately agreed, but only if another Swiss firm could assemble the mechanical system to move the glass wall.
That required an underground room to be built for the giant pane to descend into when it was lowered. Then, special permissions were needed to transport it by ship and truck because of its size. The client ultimately got the look he wanted.
“Most of our clients have multiple homes in cities across the world and they’re very specific about what they like and what they expect,” Damaa said.
He has 15 new mansions under construction along with a 70-apartment building with combined values of 16 billion dirhams (US$4.4 billion), he said.

Despite the continued rush to build, brokers and developers say that some of the exuberance of recent years is moderating. Price increases are slowing and some builders are finding it harder to buy prime locations on which to build.
Honey Deylami, an executive partner at Dubai Sotheby’s International Realty, said wealthy buyers are pushing back on price hikes after years of increases, but demand is still outstripping supply for now.
“The market is still short of supply of ultra-high-end that is ready to move into,” said Deylami, who sold around 2.7 billion dirhams’ worth of properties in 2024.
“There is a lot of supply in the pipeline or under construction, but that’ll require three to four years before it hits the market.”


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A mansion in Dubai. Priced anywhere from US$60 million to more than US$120 million, a new round of mansions and penthouses is being built in Dubai to attract the mega-wealthy around the world. Photo: Palace Group

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Dubai developers are going to extraordinary lengths so that their luxury homes can compete with those in cities like New York and Hong Kong


Dubai developers are going to extraordinary lengths so that their luxury homes can compete with those in cities like New York and Hong Kong.
