Kasco Properties: the area you buy and the area you get

You buy an off-plan apartment by its stated area. The building is then measured on completion, and the two numbers are rarely identical. What happens to the difference is set by a clause most buyers never read.

How area tolerance works

• Contracts commonly allow a variance between the sold area and the final measured area — a few per cent either way — without either party being able to walk away.
• Within the tolerance, price may or may not adjust. Some contracts adjust the price pro rata; others treat small variances as absorbed. These are very different outcomes and both are called "standard".
• Beyond the tolerance, there is usually a right to an adjustment or, for a large shortfall, to terminate. Find the threshold and read what it triggers.
• Ask which way it cuts. A clause that adjusts the price upward when the area is larger but says nothing about a shortfall is not balanced, and it is worth raising before signing rather than after measuring.

What counts as area in the first place

This matters as much as the tolerance, because the same apartment can be described honestly by several different numbers:

• Suite or net internal area — the space inside your walls.
• Balcony area, which may be included fully, partly, or not at all in the headline figure.
• Common-area share, added in some measurement conventions and not in others.
• The title deed area, in square metres, which is the definitive figure once the property exists.

When comparing two units, establish that you are comparing the same convention. A unit quoted including a large balcony and a share of common areas can look bigger and live smaller than one quoted net.

What to check

• The area-variance clause and its threshold, before signing.
• Which measurement convention the quoted area uses, in writing.
• The floor plan with dimensions, not just the marketing render.
• The final measured area at handover, against the contract — and check it rather than assuming.
• Service charge is levied per square foot, so a larger measured area also means a larger annual bill. An area increase is not automatically good news.
• Escrow, Oqood, the contractor and the delay remedy, as always.

The district note

Business Bay is heavily supplied and continuously building. New towers compete directly with yours, and a canal or Downtown view can be closed by a plot you do not own — check what is approved between your unit and the outlook before paying a premium for it.

Based on standard off-plan contract practice. Read the specific contract; terms vary between developers.