United Kingdom

The United Kingdom stands apart here for the opposite reason to Switzerland: a foreigner is allowed everything. There is no nationality restriction on buying residential property, and a non-resident buys on ordinary terms. The question is not whether you will be let in but what is being sold to you — and on that point English law is built differently from what a Dubai buyer is used to.

England and Wales recognise two distinct forms of ownership. Freehold means the land and the building are yours indefinitely. Leasehold means you hold a right of use for a term set out in the lease, while the land stays with the freeholder, to whom ground rent and a service charge are paid. Flats are almost always leasehold — what changes hands is the remaining term together with its obligations, not a square metre held forever.

The length of that remaining term is the decisive number in the transaction, and listings rarely put it in the headline. The shorter it runs, the harder the property is to mortgage and to sell: lenders are reluctant on short leases, and extension is a separate process with its own cost and timetable. Scotland operates under different law, where residential leasehold is effectively absent — these are different markets, not different cities of one country.

On status, plainly: buying property confers no right to reside. The Tier 1 Investor visa was closed in February 2022, and there is no "buy a home, receive a status" route into the United Kingdom today. Neighbouring markets on this page are sold partly on status; here it is not for sale, and any claim otherwise is worth checking with an immigration solicitor.

Tax makes the company-ownership structure familiar from Dubai expensive more often than efficient: stamp duty on purchase carries surcharges for non-residents and for additional dwellings, and residential property held through a company attracts a separate annual charge. Rental income of a non-resident landlord is taxed in the UK. All of this belongs in the model before a property is chosen.

We hold no transaction data of our own on the United Kingdom and will not invent any. The British market entered our work through a single scheme — 100 Avenue Road in London, by Arada, a developer whose UAE projects we handle. So this page covers the rules and the structure of the market, which are rewritten by legislation; on the specific scheme we quote the developer’s own figures, always with the date they were given.

The caveat: The remaining lease term matters more than the address: a short one hits both financing and the exit price.