Property guide · Dubai and Abu Dhabi
Payment plans on Dubai property: what the law fixes
How off-plan payment plans work in Dubai: instalments paid into escrow, the Oqood fee, what a bank will lend, and what you lose or get back if payments stop.
- Registering the sale at the interim register, each side2%Land Department
- Knowledge fee, AED10Land Department
- Innovation fee, AED10Land Department
- Checked2026-09-12
How plans work
Instalments go into escrow; the schedule is negotiated
No Dubai law sets a payment schedule, but every instalment goes into the project's escrow account, and the sale exists only once it is entered in the interim register.
Two instruments do the work. Law 8/2007 puts the money into an account opened in the name of the project and used for nothing else. Law 13/2008 makes an off-plan sale void unless it is entered in the interim register — the entry buyers know as Oqood, which is the subject of Oqood, escrow and how to check a project.
The schedule itself — how much on booking, how much against each construction milestone, how much at handover — is negotiated with the developer and varies from project to project. There is no standard split: no instrument fixes one.
Fees and loans
Registration fees and the off-plan mortgage cap
Registering the sale is charged on the price, to each side separately, plus two small statutory fees; a bank lends at most half against a unit that is not yet built.
The completed-sale rates, the trustee's fee and the title deed are in the cost of buying; here is only what differs before handover.
The Central Bank ceiling on an off-plan mortgage applies to every category of buyer, resident or not, first home or fifth. It is the one figure here a bank cannot negotiate upwards.
- Registering the sale at the interim register, each side2%Land Department
DLD e-service «Request to register the initial sale»: the seller and the purchaser each, on the sale value.
- Knowledge fee, AED10Land Department
Same service page, fees section.
- Innovation fee, AED10Land Department
Same service page, fees section.
- Most a bank may lend against an off-plan unitup to 50%Central Bank
Central Bank Circular 31/2013 art. (3) item 2.C — «regardless of purpose, value, or category of purchaser».
- Paid into the developer's own accountnothing: the instalments go to the project's escrow account
Law 8/2007 art. (9).
- Notice the buyer gets before termination, days30Dubai law
Law 19/2020 art. (11)(a)(1)–(3), after the developer has notified the Department.
- Retained on termination, project well advancedup to 40%Dubai law
Law 19/2020 art. (11)(a)(4)(A)–(B), of the unit's contract value, where completion is above 60%Dubai law.
- Retained on termination, works started but earlyup to 25%Dubai law
Law 19/2020 art. (11)(a)(4)(C), where completion is below 60%Dubai law.
- Refund of the rest, within, years1Dubai law
Law 19/2020 art. (11)(a)(4)(A)(3) — or within 60Dubai law days of the unit being resold, whichever comes first.
Missed payments
Notice first; the developer keeps a capped share
The developer cannot simply keep what you paid: it must notify the Land Department, serve you notice and have the completion percentage certified, and that percentage decides how much it may retain.
The buyer is given 30Dubai law days to perform. Above 80%Dubai law completion the developer may terminate and retain up to up to 40%Dubai law of the unit's contract value, or sell the unit at auction, or keep the contract alive and recover the balance. Between 60%Dubai law and 80%Dubai law the ceiling is the same up to 40%Dubai law; below 60%Dubai law, where works have begun, it falls to up to 25%Dubai law.
What is not retained comes back within 1Dubai law year of termination, or within 60Dubai law days of the unit being resold, whichever happens first. Where the project itself is cancelled, everything paid is refunded.
- Law 8/2007 art. (9)An escrow account is opened in the name of the project and dedicated exclusively to building it; a developer running several projects keeps a separate account for each.
- Law 13/2008 art. (3)A sale that is not entered in the interim register is void — registration is not an administrative afterthought, it is what makes the purchase exist.
- Law 13/2008 art. (4)A developer may not start a project or sell units off plan before taking possession of the land it will be built on.
- Law 19/2020 art. (11)(a)(1)–(3)A buyer who stops paying is not simply cut off: the developer notifies the Department, the buyer is served notice to perform, and the Department certifies how far the project has got.
- Law 19/2020 art. (11)(a)(4)How much the developer may keep on termination depends on that percentage of completion, in three bands — and it may instead auction the unit or continue and recover the balance.
- Law 19/2020 art. (11)(b)If the project is cancelled by RERA, or never began for reasons outside the buyer's control, every payment is refunded.
- Law 19/2020 art. (11)(d)These rules are part of public order: a term of the contract that departs from them is void, and the parties cannot agree their way around them.
Caveats
No fixed split, and no cooling-off period found
The split between construction and handover is a developer's offer, not a rule, and a cooling-off period appears not to exist in Dubai law at all.
A plan advertised as a fixed division between construction and handover is one company's terms on one project. No instrument fixes a schedule, so the individual contract is what to read.
The legislation portal still serves the original Article (11) of Law 13/2008, superseded in 2020. A page that looks like the primary source is not always the law in force; the bands above come from the amending law, and anyone quoting a single lower retention figure is quoting the repealed text.
- A typical split between construction and handover—
advertised splits are one developer's offer on one project, and no instrument fixes a schedule
- A monthly instalment rate during construction—
it is a commercial offer, not a rule
- A cooling-off period—
no right to withdraw within a set number of days was found in Dubai law
- A penalty for handing over late—
no general rule exists; delay is dealt with through the contract or through the regulator cancelling the project
Checked 2026-09-12
Sources
Dubai laws, DLD fees and Central Bank rules
The escrow law, the interim register law and its amendment, the Land Department's sale registration service and the Central Bank's mortgage circular.
- Law
Law No. (8) of 2007 concerning escrow accounts for real estate development in Dubai, 6 May 2007
Where the instalments go and what the escrow agent may do with them.
- Law
Law No. (13) of 2008 regulating the interim real property register, 14 August 2008
Articles (3) and (4): registration, and what a developer may not sell before.
- Amendment
Law No. (19) of 2020 amending Law No. (13) of 2008, 24 November 2020
The Article (11) in force: notice, the completion bands, the refund windows.
- Service page
DLD e-service «Request to register the initial sale», read 12 September 2026
The fees for entering an off-plan sale in the interim register.
- Regulation
Central Bank of the UAE, Circular No. 31/2013 on mortgage loans, article (3), In-Force
The ceiling on lending against a unit still being built.
- DocumentsGet the documents
The source documents
Where the portal's published text and the amending law differ, the amending law is followed, as stated above.
Questions
Ask about the payment plan you were offered
Name the project and the schedule you were quoted; we reply with its entry in the interim register, its escrow account and the fees that go with them.