Dubai: Real estate agents given 3 days to remove ‘fake’ property listings online

In a recent poll conducted by KT, 21% of those surveyed said they were lured by ads promoting houses that were either unavailable or already taken

Real estate agents in Dubai have been asked to remove all the properties unavailable for sale or rent from their digital platforms. The Dubai Land Department on Wednesday gave agents three-day deadline to remove the property advertisements that are no longer up for sale or rental.

“Through our scheduled inspections of electronic real estate portals, we noticed that there are some properties that are no longer available for sale or rent and are still displayed on the portals by real estate agents.

“Accordingly, all real estate offices must update the digital real estate platform portals within three working days, which should result in removing all unavailable properties for rental or sales,” the Dubai Land Department said on its social media platform.

Last week, the media reported how fake property advertisements scammed residents and how real estate ads or agents misled them. In a KT poll that garnered more than 2,800 responses, 21.5% said they were lured by ads listing houses that were either unavailable or already taken. A further 32.4% found that agents posted fake photos of attractive homes, but the ‘reality was very different’.

Dubai’s regulatory authority last week also fined 30 real estate firms Dh50,000 each for not adhering to terms and conditions specified in real estate advertisements. These measures have been taken by the authorities to ensure transparency in the market, which has witnessed unprecedented growth in the post-pandemic period.

There are a number of online platforms in the UAE that are offering properties for sale and rent. Dubizzle, Property Finder, Bayut, Asteco, Allsopp & Allsopp are some of the most popular platforms operating in the UAE for property purchases and rentals.

In 2023, Dubai registered a record 1.6 million real estate deals across different market segments, an increase of nearly 17per cent. while the total value of real estate deals reached Dh634 billion. Around 71,000 investors invested in Dubai’s property market for the first time last year.

The Department asked all the property brokerages and portals to send an email to licensing@rera.gov.ae with the evidence of the removal of unavailable properties from their websites.