How to read an off-plan payment plan

Dubai’s off-plan market is a calendar. Sharjah’s is too — Arada’s 35/65 and 45/55 plans are a different rhythm from Binghatti’s 80/20. You are not buying a flat so much as a sequence of cheques. Read the sequence.

80/20 means most of the price is due before you see the kitchen. It favours the developer’s cashflow and buyers who can sit in cash. 70/30 and 60/40 shift weight to handover. 1% monthly is a smoothness trick: easy to start, easy to underestimate the balloon.

Post-handover plans look kind and are. They also price in the kindness — you will pay for the privilege, in list price or in a thinner discount. Registration fees, service charges and furniture are not in the brochure total.

Construction risk is not abstract. We look at who is pouring the concrete, how many of the developer’s last three buildings handed on time, and whether the plot is already in the ground. Arada’s Aljada track record is why Masaar is a conversation.

Bring us the plan. We will put it next to a ready alternative in the same district and tell you which one actually fits the money you have, not the money the advert imagines.