Property and Mortgage Planning for Expats
A mortgage is underwritten on the assumption that you stay. Very little else in an expatriate life makes that assumption.
That is the whole difficulty in one line. Property is the largest, least liquid and least reversible commitment most households make, and here it is frequently made against an income that is tied to a visa, in a country the family may not be in when the loan matures. None of which makes buying a mistake. It makes it a decision that deserves the same scrutiny as the investment portfolio it will dwarf.
Why the arithmetic is different here
The cash required is larger than the deposit. A Dubai purchase carries a Dubai Land Department transfer fee of 4% of the sale value and a mortgage registration fee of 0.25% of the mortgage amount, plus agency commission and administrative costs. Whether these can be financed within the mortgage or must be found in cash has moved in recent years — confirm the current position with the lender before budgeting around it.
How much you can borrow is capped, and steps down. Regulation sets a ceiling on the proportion of the price that can be borrowed; it is lower for a second property than a first, and lower again off-plan. A debt burden ratio limit also applies — broadly, total debt servicing may not exceed half of income — which for many buyers binds before the deposit does.
The term is capped twice, and only one of the caps is regulation. The 25-year maximum term is set by the Central Bank. The age at final repayment is not: the Central Bank withdrew its own age limit in 2019 and left the question to each lender’s risk policy. Most banks still land near 65 for expatriate borrowers, some at 60, and a few have dropped the limit altogether — a lender’s position to ask about rather than a fixed rule to plan around. The effect on anyone buying in their forties or fifties is unchanged: a buyer at 50 is not choosing between a 25-year and a 15-year loan, they are being handed the shorter one. A shorter term means a higher monthly payment, which then meets the debt burden limit. This is the mechanism behind an unwelcome surprise — borrowing capacity falls faster with age than income rises. That it now falls by lending policy rather than by regulation is why two lenders can give the same borrower different answers.
Housing cashflow is annual, not monthly. Dubai rent is customarily paid in a small number of post-dated cheques across the year. Households moving from renting to owning have swapped a large predictable annual outflow for a monthly one plus a service charge — better in most ways, and different enough to model rather than assume.
Owning it: the questions that decide the answer
Whether a property is held in one name, jointly, or through a company or other structure is not a matter of preference. What determines it includes who is contributing, who is on the mortgage, what happens on a death or a divorce, whether a residence visa is being sought against the property, and how the arrangement is treated in every country you or the property touch.
No configuration is correct in general. The mistake worth avoiding is choosing at the point of purchase, under time pressure, on the basis of what the seller’s agent finds convenient — because changing it afterwards means a transfer, and a transfer means costs and a fresh set of consequences.
If a residence visa is part of the reasoning: the property route to a ten-year Golden Visa runs from a minimum property value of AED 2 million, and a mortgaged property can qualify where the bank issues a letter confirming it does not object. Verify the current published requirements against your own case rather than a summary — including whether off-plan qualifies, which is not clear-cut.
What happens to it when you leave, or don't
Two events end most expatriate property positions, and only one of them is planned.
A move. Selling into a market on somebody else’s timetable is the risk that property carries and a portfolio does not. The relevant question before buying is not whether prices will rise; it is what happens if you have to transact within, say, ninety days, at a moment not of your choosing.
A death. A property is an asset in a jurisdiction, and jurisdictions have views about what happens to it. For a non-Muslim expatriate in the UAE, whether a home-country law can be elected, and what a registered will can direct, are specific questions with specific answers — set out in Do British Expats in Dubai Need a UAE Will?. It is worth resolving before it is urgent, because the process runs on a court’s schedule rather than a family’s.
If you also hold property in the UK, two rules apply regardless of where you live. Since 2015 non-residents have been within the scope of UK capital gains tax on disposals of UK residential property — extended in 2019 to all UK land and to indirect disposals — and such a disposal must be reported and any tax paid within 60 days of completion, including where no tax is due. Separately, UK-situated assets remain within the scope of UK inheritance tax irrespective of the owner’s residence. The wider residence position changed materially in April 2025, and how long you have been UK resident now determines whether worldwide assets are in scope and for how long after you leave.
Tax treatment depends on your personal circumstances and can change; these are the rules that determine the outcome, not a statement of what your outcome is.
Property against everything else
Most expatriate balance sheets that look concentrated are concentrated in property, usually because a house is bought with conviction and investments are accumulated by habit. Three questions are worth asking of a property position rather than of a property.
What proportion of net worth is it, counted honestly? Net of the mortgage, and net of the fact that a quarter of a house cannot be sold to meet a school fee.
Is the yield real? After service charges, maintenance, agency fees, void periods and tax wherever the rent is taxed.
What is it hedging, and what is it exposed to? A property in the country you intend to retire to does something quite different from one in the country you currently work in: the first hedges that market, the second adds to an exposure you already have.
Where a portfolio of one asset in one city is the answer, it should be the answer on purpose.
How Paul reviews a property position
Paul Butler has worked in finance and financial services for 30 years, including 15 years advising internationally mobile professionals. Based in Dubai since 2011, he is a Private Wealth Partner at Skybound Wealth Management.
Property is looked at as part of the balance sheet rather than on its own: what it is worth net of debt, what it costs to hold, what it is doing for the plan, what it would take to exit it in a hurry, and what happens to it if you move or if you die. That conversation frequently changes the answer to a question people arrive with — whether to buy, hold, refinance or sell — because it changes what the question is being asked against.
The information here is general in nature and is not a personal recommendation. Personal financial advice is only given after a formal engagement with Skybound Wealth Management, following a full assessment of your circumstances, objectives and risk profile.
Find out where you stand
The Vulnerability Test covers fifteen areas where internationally mobile households are commonly exposed, property and housing costs among them. It takes a few minutes and produces a scored view of the gaps.
Related reading
- Do British Expats in Dubai Need a UAE Will?what a registered will can direct, and what happens without one.
- Moving Back to the UK From Dubai: The Complete Financial Checklistwhere property sits among everything else a return involves.
- Retirement Planning for Expats in the UAEvaluing property honestly inside the wider number.
Important information: General educational information only; not personal financial, investment, tax or legal advice. Treatment depends on individual circumstances and can change. Obtain jurisdiction-specific advice before acting. Planning on Purpose is Paul Butler’s educational platform; regulated financial advice is provided through the relevant Skybound Wealth entity.