Selling your Dubai property from abroad

We are a Dubai brokerage (RERA ORN 62268). We earn our commission when someone buys through us, so we gain if your buyer comes through us. If you list your property with us, what you pay us is written in Form A before any advert, as it must be with any broker. When a client takes a mortgage through a mortgage company we work with, that company pays us a small referral commission once the loan is issued. Every rule on this page comes from the law or the body that sets or publishes it: Dubai’s and the UAE’s laws, the Land Department, the Central Bank, the tax authority, GDRFA Dubai, DEWA, and the authorities of the countries our readers live in. Where only Dubai law firms or brokers describe a rule, we say so. We read them all on 12 October 2026. This is general information, not legal or tax advice.

The short version

• You may not need to fly in to sign. A sale is registered at a registration trustee office, with you there or someone acting for you. From abroad, that is usually someone holding your power of attorney. The Land Department’s FAQ also describes a sale registered for a seller abroad by email and a recorded video call: ask the trustee office whether it will do this for you. Its fully online sale, in the Dubai Now app, needs a UAE identity card.
• The power of attorney must name the sale. One made abroad is notarised and legalised up to the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs, because an apostille alone is not enough, and translated into Arabic. For a sale, the Land Department’s FAQ gives it two years.
• Have the price paid to you, not to your attorney. A manager’s cheque in your name is paid into an account in your name, in practice at a UAE bank, and most UAE banks ask you to be in the country to open one. If you have a UAE account, keep it open. If not, plan one short visit: open the account, and sign your power of attorney before a notary in Dubai on the same trip, which spares you the certifications at home.
• What it costs you: your broker, at what Form A says, usually 2% of the price plus VAT; your half of the Land Department’s 4%, unless Form F gives it all to the buyer, as brokers say it often does; the trustee’s fee, if Form F gives it to you; and the no-objection certificate. With a mortgage, add the Land Department’s fees and the bank’s fee for repaying early, which the Central Bank caps. Service charges must be paid before the sale.
• A tenant stays. A sale does not end a lease with a fixed term. To sell the property empty, you give 12 months’ notice for the end of the lease, through a notary public or by registered post.
• Off-plan, the developer sets the terms; a Golden Visa comes first. An off-plan unit can be resold only with the developer’s no-objection certificate. A property behind a Golden Visa carries a lien, and GDRFA Dubai says it “may not be disposed of” during the visa’s ten years: ask GDRFA in writing before you sign anything.
• Tax. The UAE does not tax an individual’s gain on a property held privately; with a company or a holiday-home permit in your name, ask a tax adviser. Your home country usually does: see the guide for your country below, and keep every paper.

The sale from abroad, in order

Four ways to sign, side by side

Being there. You sign Form F with the buyer, and you go to a registration trustee office for the transfer. The Land Department’s page asks a seller who does not live in the UAE for “a valid passport”, not an Emirates ID. With a mortgage, the sale is registered first and completed once your bank’s release letter is in, so expect two steps.

A power of attorney. Someone in Dubai signs for you: a relative, a friend or a lawyer. Brokers sometimes offer to do it. Betterhomes, a Dubai brokerage, says the Land Department no longer allows anyone employed by a real estate company to act as attorney; we found no published rule. Either way, your broker is paid when the sale closes, so give the power to someone who is not. The next section is about getting it right.

A video call. The Land Department’s FAQ describes it for a call “from outside the country”. You email the property’s details, the price, and your identity documents and bank accounts to “the centre’s directors”. Once they approve, the trustee’s office records a video call, and a “disbursement instruction form” is approved, to be applied electronically. The Land Department launched remote registration in May 2020, with buyer and seller identified on an audio-visual call. Its FAQ is undated and names no office and no fee. Ask the trustee office in writing whether it does this for a seller abroad, and how it pays you, before you pay for a power of attorney. With a mortgage, someone in Dubai still has to take the bank’s cheque to your bank and bring back its release letter: ask who may do that, or plan on a power of attorney as well.

The Dubai Now app. The Land Department’s “Digital Sale” runs the whole sale online, with the price paid into an escrow account it approves. The property must be a flat, an office or a townhouse in a freehold area, free from any mortgage or other restriction. The Land Department’s announcement adds that you and the buyer both need an Emirates ID and UAE PASS, that the property must have a single owner, and “a bank account inside the UAE”. A Golden Visa holder living abroad has an Emirates ID, so the app may be open to you for another property, but not for the one your visa rests on: that one carries a lien.

The power of attorney for a sale

The chain. A power of attorney made outside the UAE is accepted only once it has been certified by a notary public and the foreign ministry of the country where it was made, by the UAE embassy there, and finally by the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The UAE is not a party to the Apostille Convention, so an apostille alone is not enough; see attestation. One Dubai law firm adds that the Arabic translation must be a legal one by a translator licensed in the UAE. Each country’s steps, fees and timings are in the guides for buyers from Germany, from the UK, from Ireland, from the Netherlands and as a US citizen; for a sale, the chain is the same. If you come to Dubai once anyway, you can sign the power of attorney before a notary there instead: the certifications above are for one made outside the UAE.

How long it lasts. The Land Department’s FAQ gives a power of attorney for a sale two years. Dubai law firms read its Circular No. 29/R/2025 of July 2025 as: issued within the two years before it is presented. The circular itself is not published; we know it from these summaries. Sign it close to when it will be used.

What it must say. By the same summaries, the Land Department wants the original paper, not a scan, and wording that names the sale, such as “sale of real estate”; general wording is not enough. One firm adds that a general power of attorney is not accepted for a sale at all. So write it for this sale, and let it cover each step your attorney will take:

• the property, by its title deed number and unit;
• signing Form A with a broker and Form F with the buyer;
• applying for the no-objection certificate and paying the service charges;
• dealing with your bank: the liability letter, the payoff and the release letter;
• signing at the trustee office and paying the fees;
• closing the DEWA and district-cooling accounts in your name.

That list is ours, not the Land Department’s: have a Dubai lawyer or the trustee office read the wording before you sign it at home.

Who receives the money. With you present, one firm says the cheque must be in your name, for the full price. With an attorney, that firm lists three options: a manager’s cheque in your name; a cheque in the attorney’s name, with a receipt saying it was received on your behalf; or your notarised acknowledgement that you were paid. A second firm, writing in September 2026, says a cheque may go to the attorney only if both the power of attorney and the sale contract say so, and that declarations of having received the money are no longer accepted. Betterhomes says payments must be made in the owner’s name only, unless the Land Department approves otherwise, which it generally does for close relatives. Our advice is the same in every case: have the cheques made out to you, and let your attorney do no more than take them to your bank. Ask your bank how a cheque in your name can be paid in while you are abroad. A cheque in your attorney’s name puts the whole price in your attorney’s account, under your attorney’s control, until it is paid over to you.

When the job is done, cancel it. The Land Department notarises the cancellation of a power of attorney you gave, free, at its main building. From abroad, ask a Dubai lawyer how to revoke it, and tell your attorney in writing. The guide to property scams covers what can go wrong.

The price: check it before you list

What similar units sold for. The Land Department publishes registered sales on its website, searchable by date, area, ready or off-plan, and property type, with the amount, size, rooms and project, and lets you download them. Its list of sales shows no unit number or floor, so compare like with like yourself.

A valuation certificate. The Land Department issues one through its Dubai REST app or at a trustee centre: AED 4,000 for a residential apartment, plus AED 20 in small fees, and at a trustee centre another AED 230 plus VAT. For flats and attached villas, it is issued at once.

What buyers paid in 2026. ValuStrat’s valuation index for September 2026 was 4.5% below a year earlier, flats down more than villas, and it called the change from August “insignificant”. In July, Property Finder found final prices 5.5% to 11% below advertised ones, down from 6% to 12% in May. Price from the register, not from the adverts.

The buyer’s bank. A buyer’s bank must have the property valued independently, on site, before it irrevocably commits to lend. If the valuer says less than the agreed price, a buyer with a loan has to find the difference, or asks you to come down. Property Finder found that in July 2026 a mortgage was involved in 67.8% of villa sales and 20.3% of flat sales: if you sell a villa, expect the bank’s number to matter.

The broker, Form A and the advert

Form A. It is the Land Department’s standard contract between you and the brokerage that markets your property, and brokers must use its electronic contracts. The contract states the parties, the property, the price and the commission rate. If it is exclusive, you cannot give the property to another broker; if not, you can sign with more than one.

The commission. The law leaves it to the contract, and to custom where the contract is silent. The broker is paid once the sale contract is concluded and registered with the Land Department, unless the contract says otherwise. In 2026, Betterhomes and Property Finder both put the seller’s commission at 2% of the price plus VAT, with the buyer paying its own broker. Betterhomes also lists a “sales progression fee” of AED 7,500, paid by buyer and seller. Read Form A for every fee, and for anything payable before the sale.

The advert. A broker needs a permit for any advert, through the Land Department’s Trakheesi system, and for it a copy of the marketing contract with you. Since the Land Department’s announcement of April 2025, every advert must show the permit’s QR code. So an advert of your property that you never signed a Form A for is a warning sign: someone is using it.

Form F, the deposit and who pays what

Form F is the Land Department’s standard contract between you and the buyer, signed electronically. The rest of what a seller should know about it comes from brokers and law firms, not from a published text:

• The deposit is usually 10% of the price, as a cheque in your name that your broker holds and does not cash until the transfer.
• If the buyer walks away, you keep the deposit; if you do, you usually return it and pay the buyer the same amount again. fäm, a Dubai brokerage, adds that 20% of that sum goes to the broker, so the side not at fault receives 80%.
• From abroad, that is your largest risk. If your power of attorney, your bank’s letters or GDRFA’s answer on a Golden Visa are not ready by the date in Form F, the delay is yours. Do not sign Form F until the power of attorney is in Dubai, and set the date with room to spare.
• Who pays which fee is whatever Form F says. Dubai’s fee resolution shares the Land Department’s 4% equally between seller and buyer unless they agree otherwise, and the Land Department’s page lists 2% for each; Betterhomes says the seller does not pay it, as a matter of practice. Agree it, and the trustee’s fee, in writing.

Write three more things into Form F: in whose name the cheques are made out; if the property is let, how the tenant’s deposit, and any rent you hold for months after the transfer, post-dated cheques included, pass to the buyer; and the date by which the transfer must happen.

The paperwork before the transfer

Service charges. A unit may not be sold until its service charges are paid to the building’s management.

The no-objection certificate (NOC). For a finished property in a freehold area, the Land Department asks for an electronic NOC, through the Dubai REST app. For a unit whose service charges are invoiced through Mollak, it takes three to five working days. The Land Department’s 2017 guide for investors says the NOC is there to show that the seller has paid all service charges, and that the developer may charge AED 500 for it. Ask the developer or the management company what yours costs today.

Your bank’s letters, if you still owe it: see below.

DEWA. Ask the trustee office whether it wants DEWA’s clearance certificate at the transfer. If so, have the final bill requested a few days before.

The buyer’s side. The buyer’s bank, if any, values the property and confirms the loan before the transfer.

Transfer day

At the trustee office, the documents are checked, the fees paid, the buyer entered, and the sale registered. The Land Department puts the service at 25 minutes. The trustee’s own fee is AED 4,000 plus VAT, or AED 2,000 plus VAT for a price below AED 500,000: agree in Form F who pays it. Your attorney brings the original power of attorney with its Arabic translation, the NOC and, with a mortgage, your bank’s liability letter; ask the trustee office which copies of your passport it wants.

The price is paid by manager’s cheques, drawn by a bank on itself. With a mortgage, the Land Department’s page lists three: one to your bank for what you owe, one “in the seller’s name” for the rest, and one to the Land Department for its fee. Cheques expire six months after their date; at HSBC, for example, one paid in before the morning’s cut-off is in the account the same working day.

After the transfer, close the utilities in your name. DEWA sends the final bill by email and SMS within 24 working hours of the disconnection date you ask for, and charges AED 125 plus AED 20 to disconnect small meters. It refunds an owner’s deposit, AED 2,000 for a flat or AED 4,000 for a villa, only on a sale, to an IBAN in exactly the name registered with DEWA. Empower, the district-cooling company, issues its final bill within two working days, and refunds a customer who lives outside the UAE without a UAE account by international bank transfer.

Getting the money home

A cheque in your name needs an account in your name. Emirates Islamic says most UAE banks, itself included, require applicants “to be present in the UAE” to verify their identity. Mashreq opens current accounts for non-residents, but only in foreign currencies, not in dirhams. Ask any bank you approach whether it will pay in a cheque in dirhams, at what rate, and whether you must come in. If you still have an account from when you lived in the UAE, keep it open until the money is home. More in source of funds.

Is a UAE account required? A report in Gulf News in June 2025, citing industry sources, said sellers abroad must now have UAE accounts, and that only cheques in the owner’s name are accepted. We found no published rule saying so, and the Land Department’s video-call route asks for your bank accounts without saying where they must be. Ask the trustee office.

Sending it. From your account in Dubai, the money goes home by bank transfer. The UAE Ministry of Economy says individuals and investors may “freely repatriate their profits in entirety”, and we found no UAE limit on sending a sale price abroad. Ask your UAE bank for its fee and the rate it will use before you send: on a large sum, the rate can cost more than the fee. The dirham is pegged at 3.6725 to the US dollar; against the euro or the pound, the rate on the day you convert decides.

Keep the papers. For the tax at home and for your own bank: the title deed and your purchase papers, with the dates and amounts of every payment; Form F; the Land Department’s receipt and the new title deed; the broker’s invoice; the bank’s liability and release letters; a copy of each cheque; and the statements showing the money arriving in Dubai and at home.

At home:

• Germany: if you live in Germany, you report to the Bundesbank yourself, each month, any payment of more than €50,000 that you receive from or make to a foreign person. As we read it, the price your buyer pays you is one, even when it goes into your account in Dubai; ask the Bundesbank, and ask whether the later transfer to your account in Germany counts too. More in What you report in Germany.
• The UK: HMRC’s 60-day return is for UK property; how you report a gain on Dubai property, and when you pay, is in the UK guide.
• Ireland: the tax on a gain made between January and November is due by 15 December, and on a December sale by 31 January; the return follows by 31 October of the next year. Keep the tax aside when you transfer.
• The Netherlands: what you still hold on 1 January counts in box 3.
• The US: foreign accounts that together pass $10,000 at any time in the year go on your FBAR.

What the sale costs you

One flat, worked through. A flat sold for AED 1.8 million, with AED 600,000 still owed on a variable-rate loan:

What reaches your account in Dubai is about AED 1.12 million if you pay half the 4%, or AED 1.15 million if the buyer pays it all; most of the difference from the price is the loan. The fees themselves come to about 4.6% of the price, or 2.6%. The costs guide has every fee from the buyer’s side too.

How long it takes

No official source gives a total, and the timelines brokers publish rest on no data we could find. These are the steps whose times are published, and the ones to ask about:

The slow parts are usually the power of attorney, your bank’s letters, the buyer’s bank, and a tenant whose lease runs on. Start the power of attorney before you list.

If the property is let

The lease stays. Selling a property does not affect the tenant’s right to stay under a lease with a fixed term made with the previous owner. The buyer becomes the landlord, takes on all your obligations under the lease, must give the tenant a statement of the deposit, and may raise the rent, under the usual rules, but not the deposit.

To sell it empty, you can ask the tenant to leave only at the end of the lease, because you want to sell, with at least 12 months’ notice through a notary public or by registered post. The Land Department asks you to show that the sale is real. Our guide to letting from abroad has the rest.

Viewings need the tenant. Neither the tenancy law nor the Land Department’s unified tenancy contract gives the landlord a right to show the property to buyers. Ask the tenant, agree the times, and put a viewing clause in the next lease’s addendum.

If you still owe the bank

The bank must agree. The owner of a mortgaged property may not deal with it without the bank’s consent. In practice the bank is paid off at the sale: you ask it for a liability letter, which states what you owe. Ask how long the letter stays valid.

Two steps at the trustee office. The Land Department registers the sale of a mortgaged property with the bank’s liability letter and three manager’s cheques, and gives the bank’s cheque to the seller “to complete their procedures with the bank”. Once you, the buyer or your attorney bring back the bank’s release letter, the sale is completed. From abroad, your attorney does this, so the power of attorney must cover it.

What it costs. The Land Department’s page lists AED 1,000, AED 20 in small fees and AED 525 for registering the sale of a mortgaged property, and AED 1,290 for releasing the mortgage, with AED 315 for the registrar. The bank’s fee for repaying early is capped at 1% of what you owe or AED 10,000, whichever is less, plus VAT, and its liability and clearance letters at AED 85 and AED 95, plus VAT. On a fixed rate, the bank may also charge its actual cost of breaking the rate. Some banks charge less: see If you sell, move the loan or fall behind.

If you owe more than the buyer pays, the bank’s cheque must still cover the debt in its liability letter, or there is no release letter and no transfer. You pay the difference before the transfer.

If it is off-plan

The developer decides when. The Land Department’s FAQ says a unit can be resold before it is transferred to the land register “after obtaining a No Objection Certificate from the developer”, and the sale is void unless it is entered in the interim register. The share of the price you must have paid first is set by the developer and your sale and purchase agreement; we found no Land Department rule that sets a minimum. Two developers publish theirs: Dubai Properties asks for 40% of the price and AED 5,500 in fees; Ellington for 30% (50% on ten named projects) and AED 5,250.

The fee. The Land Department charges 4% of the value of the sale contract, shared equally unless agreed otherwise.

From abroad. The same routes apply: you there, or an attorney whose power of attorney names the resale of your unit. Ask the developer in writing whether it needs you or your attorney in person, and how long its NOC takes. More in Selling before handover.

If your Golden Visa rests on it

GDRFA Dubai’s terms require a lien on the property “to ensure the continuity of ownership throughout the validity of the Golden Residency”, and say the property “may not be disposed of” during the ten years. On those terms, you cannot sell while the visa runs. We found no official text on how the lien is lifted, on the visas of the family members you sponsor, or on moving the visa to another property. Ask GDRFA Dubai in writing before you sign Form F, and leave time in Form F for its answer. More in The lien.

If you own it with someone, inherited it, or hold it through a company

With someone. The Land Department registers the sale of a whole property or a share of it. To sell the whole, every owner on the title deed signs, or is represented. The Dubai Now sale is only for a single owner.

Inherited. The heirs are first registered as owners, on a letter from Dubai Courts, another UAE court or the Awqaf; the Land Department charges AED 1,000 for each property. Then they sell like any owner.

Through a company. The company sells, and it must first be registered with the Land Department. A company set up abroad that earns income from property in the UAE, including from selling it, has a taxable presence in the UAE for corporate tax. The rule has applied since June 2023, and is now in Cabinet Resolution No. 35 of 2025. Ask a UAE tax adviser before you agree a price.

Tax in the UAE, and at home

In the UAE. An individual’s income from a sale of property held privately, not through a company or under a licence, is real estate investment income, which corporate tax leaves out; the tax authority’s guide gives the sale of a home as an example. Its FAQ says a foreign individual who owns property in the UAE personally “would generally not be subject to UAE CT”. If you let the property as a holiday home under a permit in your own name, or hold it through a company, ask a tax adviser before you sell.

VAT. The resale of a home is exempt. Selling an office or a shop is taxed at 5%. The tax authority’s registration threshold “is not applicable to foreign businesses”, and the VAT law makes a person with no place of residence in the UAE register when nobody else in the UAE is liable for the tax on the sale. If you live abroad and sell an office, ask a UAE tax adviser before you agree the price. More in the guide to commercial property.

At home. Your country usually taxes the gain, worked out in your own currency: Germany, the UK, Ireland, the Netherlands and the US. The UK taxes its residents’ foreign gains, Ireland its residents’ gains on foreign property, and the US its citizens’ worldwide income. Germany taxes the gain if you sell within ten years of buying, unless you lived in it yourself the whole time, or in the year of the sale and the two years before. The Netherlands, under today’s rules, taxes what you own on 1 January, not the gain. If you resell an off-plan contract, ask your adviser how your country treats it.

Scams aimed at owners abroad

• Your property advertised by someone else. Every advert needs a permit and its QR code, and a permit needs your Form A. If you see your unit advertised for sale or rent through a broker you never signed with, report it.
• A “buyer” who asks you for a fee first, or sends a payment confirmation instead of paying. The price is paid at the trustee office by manager’s cheques, or, in the Dubai Now app, into an escrow account the Land Department approves.
• Bank details that change by email or message. Confirm any change by calling a number you already have. See Payments that go to the wrong account.
• A cheque. Check a manager’s cheque with the bank that issued it, on a number from that bank’s website, not one printed on the cheque.
• A power of attorney that says too much, or one you never gave: one stretched beyond its purpose, or one forged. See If you own a property and live abroad.

Claims you will meet, checked

• “You have to fly in to sell.” Not to sign: someone can sign for you on a power of attorney, and the Land Department describes a sale by video call for sellers abroad. But without a UAE bank account in your name, you will probably need one short visit to open it.
• “An apostille is enough.” No: the UAE is not a party to the Apostille Convention. The power of attorney goes through the UAE embassy and the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
• “You must name a friend or relative living in the UAE as your attorney.” We found no such rule. The Land Department’s FAQ asks for a power of attorney legalised as above, not for an attorney who lives in the UAE.
• “The buyer can make the cheque out to the Land Department.” We found no current Land Department text for that. Its page for a mortgaged sale lists a cheque “in the seller’s name” for the rest of the price.
• “The seller pays the 4%” and “the buyer pays the 4%”. Both are stated as rules online. The fee resolution shares it equally unless the parties agree otherwise: Form F decides.
• “The trustee charges AED 4,200 plus VAT.” AED 4,200 already includes the VAT: the Land Department lists AED 4,000 plus VAT, or AED 2,000 plus VAT below AED 500,000.
• “You can sell in the Dubai Now app from anywhere.” Only with an Emirates ID and UAE PASS, for you and the buyer.
• “Off-plan, the Land Department requires 30% to 40% paid before a resale.” We found no such rule; the developer and the sale and purchase agreement set it.
• “There is no tax on selling Dubai property.” Not in the UAE, for an individual holding a home privately; an office sale carries VAT. At home, usually there is.
• “A sale ends the lease.” No: a lease with a fixed term continues with the buyer.
• “Your attorney can collect the money for you.” Possibly, on conditions; but then the whole price sits in your attorney’s account until it is paid over to you.

Before you list: twelve checks

Questions and answers

Related guides

• What buying property in Dubai costs on top of the price
• Getting a mortgage in Dubai when you live abroad
• Renting out your Dubai property from abroad: a tenant or a holiday home
• Property scams in Dubai: how they work, and the checks that stop them
• Getting a Golden Visa through Dubai property
• What can go wrong when you buy off-plan in Dubai
• How to buy property in Dubai from abroad, step by step
• Dubai property terms, explained
• Buying property in Dubai from Germany
• Buying property in Dubai from the UK