DOHA: House rents are likely to ease further this year but a sudden spurt is possible later this year due to a likely influx of half-a-million foreign workers, says a real estate expert.

Due to the expected launch of a number of new projects this year, the population of the country is expected to rise by 500,000, said Falah Matar, general manager of a prominent real estate company.

Asked as to why so many ready-to-occupy buildings were lying vacant all over Doha with boards screaming 'For Rent', he said the owners of these apartment buildings and villa complexes were waiting for a government department or a prestigious private concern to take them on rent wholesale to house their employees.

According to Matar, the trend is changing with an increasing number of landlords preferring to give away their properties directly to companies or government ministries or departments on a wholesale basis.

"The owners are avoiding agents due to a number of problems they had with them (middlemen) in the recent past," said Matar.

One of the advantages of giving away a whole property to a credible organisation to accommodate its employees is that rents are paid at least three months in advance and there are no hassles of collecting rents from individual tenants.

"Not all these ready-to-occupy building you see are complete. Finishing touches are being given to a vast majority of them, yet the owners have put up boards outside saying they are for rent," said Matar.

He, however, said that waiting for a company or government agency to take an apartment building on rent is not a wise move on the part of the owners.

"You can give individual apartments on rent to tenants you can trust...to those who are in good jobs, for instance," he said.

Waiting with uncertainty means that the owner is losing money.

"It is prudent to give away individual apartments to tenants. It makes business sense," he said.

© The Peninsula 2010

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