Dubai: After 14-year wait, couple reclaims over Dh265,000 in off-plan property case

Khaleej Times

13-02-2025

After a 14-year wait, a couple finally recovered the Dh266,352 downpayment fees they paid for a house that was not built on time in Dubai.
Back in 2008, Dr Bassam Mahboub and his wife bought an off-plan house in an Al Qudra residential compound's 'cluster C' from Remraam developer. Bassam paid instalments for a year and was receiving photos from the developer featuring the building process, when everything came to a halt.
After paying a few instalments, he visited the site and realised that no progress had been made with his cluster. "They had not even put the foundation yet. It seems they were sending me photos from clusters A and B,' he explained.
Realising the lack of progress, Dr Mahboub stopped paying the remaining instalments. Shortly after, the developer told him that he lost both the downpayments and the house for failing to meet the instalments' deadlines.
'They claimed that they issued a notice that I have lost both the house and the paid amounts, but I neither received it nor signed it. At the time I was busy with special circumstances, and when I followed up with them two years later, they said I lost everything.'
'Over a decade later, I met lawyer Ali Al Abbadi and told him my story. He said we can file a lawsuit and claim the money back because the buyer has the right to freeze payments if the seller did not fulfil his end of the contract.'
The lawsuit filed in 2021 passed through five stages of litigation in Dubai Courts, starting with the first instance court ruling in favour of Dr Bassam. The other party referred the ruling to the appeals court to cancel the ruling. When their request was denied, they further appealed the verdict at the cassation court, who bounced it back to appeals for lacking proof that the company did not keep their end of the deal. Further expert reports led the appeals court to rule in favour of Dr Bassam once again, driving the company to file a second final appeal at the court of cassation.
The supreme court's final verdict, which Khaleej Times received a copy of, said the company had no right to confiscate the property and instalments, even if the buyer had received a notification. A judicial expert report showed that the company breached their end of the contract, as they were supposed to hand the house to the buyer in June 2010.
However, up until May 2011, the project was only 42.8 per cent ready, which proves that they did not fulfil their end of the deal. The cassation court upheld the lower court's ruling to return the instalment money to the plaintiff.
The property was finally completed in May 2023.
The amounts were paid back to Dr Bassam through the executive court, shortly after. 'Our firm was following up the execution process every day,' said Al Abbadi, adding: 'The company paid out of the fear that we would issue a freezing request on their assets if they don't pay.'