No eviction if no 12-month Dubai notary notice

Tenants in Dubai are powerful today and no eviction from an apartment can take place unless the landlord has served a 12-month notary public notice, Real Estate Regulatory Agency (Rera) chief said on Monday.

“A landlord has to give a notarized notice to the tenant to vacate the apartment if he/she is going to sell it. The tenant can ask for the memorandum of understanding, but if the owner does not present it, he/she can approach the dispute committee,” Marwan bin Ghalita, Chief Executive Officer, Rera, said addressing a seminar at Cityscape on Monday.

“If there is no valid reason, the committee is likely to extend your contract. In case, the owner does not sell, the committee will block it in the system so he/she can’t rent it and if the owner is going to use it for personal use then he/she cannot lease for two years.”

Emirates 24|7 had reported earlier that there were only three reasons that qualify or give the right to the landlord/property owner to evict a tenant:

1. Breach of tenancy agreement or violation of a law
2. Landlord wants to sell the property
3. Landlord wants to self-occupy the property

“Under the second and third scenarios, the landlord can only demand eviction of the tenant once the lease term has expired and a proper notice has been served. The notice period must be 12 months in advance and served through the notary public,” Ludmila Yamalova, Managing Partner, HPL Yamalova and Plewka JLT, had told this website.

(Read: Dubai tenant can be evicted for 3 main reasons: Legal expert)

Dubai has a rental slab in place (rent index calculate) that has to be followed by landlords when increasing rents. However, not many landlords follow the rent calculator and were seeking arbitrary
increases.

Rera has always emphasized that tenants should approach the Rental Dispute Settlement Center of Dubai Land Department in cases of higher rental hikes, with this website reporting that a tenant lease was extended when the landlord did not serve a 12-month notice.

(Read: No eviction even if you signed non-renewable rent contract in Dubai)

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