Dubailand has climbed to the top of the list of most popular areas in Dubai, an analysis by ServiceMarket has revealed. The analysis shows a major shift in Dubai’s moving house trends as an increasing number of people now seem to prefer newly developed suburbs compared to highly populated and established areas like Dubai Marina and Downtown. 

Based on thousands of residential moving requests placed through ServiceMarket in 2017, the annual moving trends report highlights neighbourhoods with the highest influx of residents and draws comparisons with earlier studies to find out how the moving-in and moving-out activity has shifted recently.  

With Dubailand emerging as the most popular area, Dubai Marina, which had held the top position for the past two years, has been pushed to the second place. These two areas are followed by Downtown, Dubai Silicon Oasis, and JVC/JVT.  

Image credit: ServiceMarket

It’s not surprising that popular areas like Dubai Marina and Downtown see a lot of moving-out activity since they have a higher volume of homes compared to other areas, and consequently see a higher turnover. A consideration of these results is that around a third of people who move out of apartments move to another house in the same area. However, Dubai Marina/JBR and Downtown witnessed more moving-out activity compared to moving-in activity, and as a result, lost a significant number of residents in 2017. On the other hand, Dubailand experienced more moving-in activity.   

The report shows how moving trends have changed since 2016, where the influx of residents to Dubai Marina/JBR was almost as much as that of Dubailand and Downtown combined. But this year, Dubailand has overtaken Dubai Marina, and Downtown is not far behind. Quickly gaining popularity in the region, Dubai Silicon Oasis has also risen from the seventh to the fourth position in just a year. 

ServiceMarket suggests that the most likely explanation for why suburbs like Dubailand and Dubai Silicon Oasis are overtaking more developed areas in popularity is that residents face lower rents and purchase prices, there is less traffic and facilities like malls, schools, and theme parks are quickly emerging. 

To see ServiceMarket's full report, register here.

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