Latest news with #MyOwnHome
The National
24-04-2025
- Business
- The National
My Own Home: Dubai homeowner says this Dh2.3m home is best for Abu Dhabi commute
My Own Home takes you inside a reader-owned property to ask how much they paid, why they decided to buy and what they have done with it since moving in Veena Menon has called the UAE home since 1999. The Indian has spent most of her life here with her family. While she moved to India for higher education, she soon returned to Dubai, got married and started a family of her own. Now she lives in a three-bedroom apartment in the Midtown community of Dubai Production City, with her husband, daughter and parents. They chose this location because it is easy to slip out onto the motorway and head to Abu Dhabi, where she works as a programme lead at Zayed International Airport's air traffic control centre. While they only bought the place in January, they had already been living in the property for two years. They loved it so much that they decided to make it their own. The National takes a look around. Because I stay with my parents, my mum was very particular that we have a closed kitchen and not an open one. And this has a layout with a closed kitchen, and that works well for us. It's the style of our cooking, with a lot of oil and spices, flavours, fragrances and all that. It's better if it's closed so that everything is contained. We have three bedrooms. We have a maid's room as well, which we've conveniently converted into a storeroom. I have a six-year-old, so she has her own room with her toys and her stuff. We also have a pretty big balcony, which looks over the community children's park. So, if my daughter goes out to play, I just have to go to the balcony and I can see her playing downstairs. Everything in the community is on the first floor. On the ground floor is where the car park is, so we can easily leave the kids in the community and not worry about them going into the roads or anything. December 30 was when the registration was completed, so we technically bought it in January. We had been a tenant in the same apartment since 2023, so we thought we'd make it our own because we like the community. We like where we are at, where we are staying, so we didn't want to move. We were very particular about getting this apartment. We bought it for Dh2.3 million. We just bought it, so I haven't seen if that's changed, but the area is so popular right now. I'm sure it's going to appreciate soon, once the new airport opens in Dubai World Central. I work at the Abu Dhabi airport, so I do the commute every day from here. Because of the location, it is an easy commute. It just takes me about 45 to 50 minutes to get to the airport and the same coming back. The commute to Abu Dhabi was my number one priority. I wanted that to be easy. We were initially staying in Sports City, which isn't far from here as well, but then we found this community. My husband works in Dubai Industrial City, so for him, as well, this is an easy exit. I also love the community and how many friends there are for my daughter. There are a lot of different nationalities and people from all over and they all meet downstairs in the evening. About 4pm or 5pm, the community becomes really lively, with people walking. There's a jogging trail, there's a swimming pool, a gym, and all of that going on. I come back from Abu Dhabi and I just go out for a run. I don't like to go to the gym, but there are easy jogging trails and all sorts of sports equipment out there in the community like rowing machines, scooters, bikes and things like that, so I make use of all of that. For my daughter, it's easy because she goes down and I don't have to worry at all because she has friends. We know who her friends are. We all meet downstairs in the park. We know she'll come back home when it's time. When we moved in, it was in pretty good condition, so we haven't had to do any renovations. We were a tenant here, so there were minor maintenances here and there we had to organise, but no renovation was required. Maybe after three or four years, we might consider doing some renovations, but at this moment, I don't see a need. My style is more homely and very warm. We have a lot of photographs. We travel quite a bit, so there are photos all over the place. There are also little things that we collect from our travels. It's very minimal, but very homely. We're not planning to move out any time soon. This is home. The UAE is home. My husband's got a business, so he has settled. My parents have retired, but they're staying back so they can support us. They keep travelling to India, but after spending maybe one month there, they want to come back. Having experienced this community now, I can't think about moving out from here, even if I was working somewhere in Dubai. We're so settled here, especially with my daughter having a lot of friends from different nationalities, and I can see her enjoying all of that. And there are so many festivals celebrated here, not just Indian, although there are a lot of those, but also Thanksgiving and Eid. We get a flavour of all of it. Do you want to see your home featured in our series? Email kgillett@ for more information.
The National
24-04-2025
- Business
- The National
My Own Home: Homeowner says Dubai Production City is the best location for Abu Dhabi commuters
My Own Home takes you inside a reader-owned property to ask how much they paid, why they decided to buy and what they have done with it since moving in Veena Menon has called the UAE home since 1999. The Indian has spent most of her life here with her family. While she moved to India for higher education, she soon returned to Dubai, got married and started a family of her own. Now she lives in a three-bedroom apartment in the Midtown community of Dubai Production City, with her husband, daughter and parents. They chose this location because it is easy to slip out onto the motorway and head to Abu Dhabi, where she works as a programme lead at Zayed International Airport's air traffic control centre. While they only bought the place in January, they had already been living in the property for two years. They loved it so much that they decided to make it their own. The National takes a look around. Because I stay with my parents, my mum was very particular that we have a closed kitchen and not an open one. And this has a layout with a closed kitchen, and that works well for us. It's the style of our cooking, with a lot of oil and spices, flavours, fragrances and all that. It's better if it's closed so that everything is contained. We have three bedrooms. We have a maid's room as well, which we've conveniently converted into a storeroom. I have a six-year-old, so she has her own room with her toys and her stuff. We also have a pretty big balcony, which looks over the community children's park. So, if my daughter goes out to play, I just have to go to the balcony and I can see her playing downstairs. Everything in the community is on the first floor. On the ground floor is where the car park is, so we can easily leave the kids in the community and not worry about them going into the roads or anything. December 30 was when the registration was completed, so we technically bought it in January. We had been a tenant in the same apartment since 2023, so we thought we'd make it our own because we like the community. We like where we are at, where we are staying, so we didn't want to move. We were very particular about getting this apartment. We bought it for Dh2.3 million. We just bought it, so I haven't seen if that's changed, but the area is so popular right now. I'm sure it's going to appreciate soon, once the new airport opens in Dubai World Central. I work at the Abu Dhabi airport, so I do the commute every day from here. Because of the location, it is an easy commute. It just takes me about 45 to 50 minutes to get to the airport and the same coming back. The commute to Abu Dhabi was my number one priority. I wanted that to be easy. We were initially staying in Sports City, which isn't far from here as well, but then we found this community. My husband works in Dubai Industrial City, so for him, as well, this is an easy exit. I also love the community and how many friends there are for my daughter. There are a lot of different nationalities and people from all over and they all meet downstairs in the evening. About 4pm or 5pm, the community becomes really lively, with people walking. There's a jogging trail, there's a swimming pool, a gym, and all of that going on. I come back from Abu Dhabi and I just go out for a run. I don't like to go to the gym, but there are easy jogging trails and all sorts of sports equipment out there in the community like rowing machines, scooters, bikes and things like that, so I make use of all of that. For my daughter, it's easy because she goes down and I don't have to worry at all because she has friends. We know who her friends are. We all meet downstairs in the park. We know she'll come back home when it's time. When we moved in, it was in pretty good condition, so we haven't had to do any renovations. We were a tenant here, so there were minor maintenances here and there we had to organise, but no renovation was required. Maybe after three or four years, we might consider doing some renovations, but at this moment, I don't see a need. My style is more homely and very warm. We have a lot of photographs. We travel quite a bit, so there are photos all over the place. There are also little things that we collect from our travels. It's very minimal, but very homely. We're not planning to move out any time soon. This is home. The UAE is home. My husband's got a business, so he has settled. My parents have retired, but they're staying back so they can support us. They keep travelling to India, but after spending maybe one month there, they want to come back. Having experienced this community now, I can't think about moving out from here, even if I was working somewhere in Dubai. We're so settled here, especially with my daughter having a lot of friends from different nationalities, and I can see her enjoying all of that. And there are so many festivals celebrated here, not just Indian, although there are a lot of those, but also Thanksgiving and Eid. We get a flavour of all of it. Do you want to see your home featured in our series? Email kgillett@ for more information.
The National
19-04-2025
- Business
- The National
My Own Home: Family of five love ‘resort-style living' in Dh1.6 million Dubai Production City apartment
My Own Home takes you inside a reader-owned property to ask how much they paid, why they decided to buy and what they have done with it since moving in Long-term UAE resident Akther Arkate invested in his family's future by buying an off-plan property in Dubai after many years of renting. The engineer, who works for air traffic control in the emirate, lives in a three-bedroom apartment in Dubai Production City with his wife and three children – two of whom study abroad during term. The couple bought their home in 2017 and moved in during 2020, at the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic. While the family have settled in well, and they love the neighbourhood, they have bought a town house, again off-plan, and will move when it is ready, by 2028. Meanwhile, they plan to enjoy the only place in the UAE that has truly felt like home. The National takes a look around. It's a three-bedroom apartment with a good layout. It's a compact layout, but it's not too small. It's perfect for us. We have a living room, which is quite huge, where we can accommodate a lot of visitors or friends. The three bedrooms are just the right size for us. We enjoy living here. We had bought a house in India and we had spent a lot of money over there. Then something struck my mind: we have spent so much money in India, and we stay in that house once a year, yet we stay over here for the majority of our time. So, we thought: let's look at some places over here that we can call our own home, rather than a rented home. Deyaar [the developer] was running a fantastic payment plan at that time. Construction had just begun, so you could pay Dh10,000 per month until the completion, which was around three years away, and at the time of handover you could go into a mortgage. We paid it for around 33 months, and then we did the mortgage. The total price was around Dh1.6 million, all inclusive, with all the government charges and everything. Because the community opened in Covid, nobody really knew Dubai Production City. It's a wonderful community, but it has not appreciated on regular Dubai levels. It might fetch around Dh1.8 million or Dh1.9 million now. As long as it doesn't depreciate, it's good. If you consider you're paying whatever you were paying as rent before, and it was going down the drain, at least now the property is yours, the asset is yours. The payment plan was what attracted us, but then we saw the layout of the community. It's a 1km-long community with one level full of amenities. It's like resort-style living. The community has grown. It's well maintained, with lots of amenities. There are three swimming pools, three gyms. Anybody who has kids below 12, this is a perfect place for them to grow up, because you have a 1km podium, which is secure, so you drop your kids on level one and it's a closed environment. They cannot go anywhere. It's also adjacent to Jumeirah Golf Estates, which is one of the top-notch communities in Dubai. The reason it's called Dubai Production City is there is a production free zone in the middle of the community, so there are a lot of printing or storage warehouses and facilities. Then there is a City Centre mall as well. Before we moved in we'd wanted to renovate it as per our aspirations. But then during Covid everything was bust, so we were not able to do what we wanted to do. It's very difficult to renovate when you are occupying the house. We did some minor modifications, but nothing major. If I were to do it, I'd renew the kitchen, but otherwise there is not much renovation that is required. The space is underutilised. The NOC (no objection certificate) process is a pain, so that's what's kept us from doing it. Modern with a classical touch. It's a modern layout, with classical furniture. During Covid, we also bought a town house in Villanova and we thought we would move there when it was ready. But we got so used to this community and this place, that we didn't end up moving. Now we've sold that property and taken another property in Athlon by Aldar, just across from Global Village. It's our goal to move over there when it's ready in 2028, because the kids are growing. Do you want to see your home featured in our series? Email kgillett@ for more information.
The National
09-04-2025
- Business
- The National
My Own Home: Feng shui expert loves living in Dh2.75m, Vastu-compliant Dubai Marina apartment
My Own Home takes you inside a reader-owned property to ask how much they paid, why they decided to buy and what they have done with it since moving in Kanupriya Saraf wears many hats in her career, which encompasses life mentoring and astrology, but her work as a feng shui and Vastu consultant was a guiding force when choosing the home she'd live in. She moved to Dubai from India two years ago and bought her first property here last May. She chose a two-bedroom apartment in Dubai Marina, which she got for Dh2.75 million, and where she now lives with her one-and-a-half-year-old Maltipoo puppy and a house helper. Everything from the style of the building's reception to the communal lounge and her north-east-facing property has created a sense of 'Zen' for Ms Saraf, and she has no plans to move out any time soon. The National takes a look around. I put a lot of focus on the home and everything that goes inside its four walls. It's a two-bedroom flat, and there's also a maid's room. There are two bathrooms and one powder room. There is an open-style kitchen, which I put a glass door over because we Indians don't always want our cooking smell all inside the house. I'm generally sensitive to smells as well. I don't get a straight view of the Palm, but then it's on the 12th floor, so from the balcony I do get a small view of the water body of the Marina. I bought it in May 2024 for about Dh2.75 million. I do not know what it's worth now, but I have done a lot on renovation of the flat, so I don't bother checking its worth. I've changed the ceiling lighting. There was just one lamp in the centre of every room, but I put spotlights and LED lighting to enhance the mood. I also put some chandeliers around the house, and yellow lighting as there was white light everywhere. I changed the bathrooms, especially the wash basin and some of the tiling. I added the kitchen door, and I made more chests of drawers and cabinet storage in the kitchen. I added more storage in the maid's room. I also put something to circulate the air on top of the ceiling. That's very important for me with my work in the space of feng shui. I need to put the element of wind in the house, so it allows for the air circulation, especially in the hot environment. I wanted to balance the wind element with the water element of the Marina. There's a lot of wind if you stand on the balcony, if I open the doors, which is great. I also changed the wall colours and added knick-knacks here and there. I believe that if somebody does have the finances in hand, it makes sense to buy a property. You get the visa when you buy a property and if you're looking to stay here, it just makes sense. If somebody does decide to leave, they can always rent it, so I know that even if I ever left Dubai, I can always come back. I will always have some friends living here. I believe a home is something that is owned by me. Even from the Vastu and feng shui concept, a home is a very safe space for me, so I find that safety when I own that property myself and I can decorate it as I please. I like to create a Zen space in the house. I keep my walls and my curtains white, very minimalistic or ivory beige, or a very light brown colour, and then I complement it with a touch of orange colours. The orange represents joy and creativity. In my living room, I've used the orange colour in my cushions and I like to add natural elements as well, because I really like nature. I have some plants and the cushion covers have birds on them. The furniture will add the warmth, add the wood element with the brown colour. It's not very bright, but it's a very aesthetically pleasing environment, very peaceful, very Zen, very serene, but also very luxurious and very classy at the same time. In my bedroom, the bed is a very nice blue colour, and then everything else is white, and the chandelier and the fans are golden. So it's a combination of white, which represents purity, gold represents luxury and the blue is just adding a touch of colour. I mix these concepts in the house throughout. The building is excellent. I got the north-east-facing flat, which is very feng shui and Vastu-compliant. I check all the geometries and the energy, not just of the flat, but even the building. There's a beautiful reception and the facility management staff in the building are very helpful, very professional. There's a walking track in the building, there's a swimming pool, there's a gym, there's a steam room and sauna. There is a kids' play area. There is also a lounge if I want to host a small event, which can accommodate easily up to 25 people. It has free guest parking available. There's also a concierge service. I have had residency in Dubai for the last eight years and one of my family members used to have a home in the Marina, so I used to be in and out of the area a lot. But then, when I finally decided to make the UAE my home, I was exploring flats in Marina, JLT, JBR, Palm Jumeirah and Dubai Hills. I was sure that I was looking for a flat. Because I live by myself, I wasn't so open to a town house and I needed a bigger budget for that. The building is so strategically located that you enter and exit the Marina from where I am, so you never get stuck in traffic. It's also a 1,650-square-foot flat. If I compare it to Dubai Hills, I would have to pay a lot more there, and for me, size was important. Generally, the Marina is a more well-established community and I wanted to be around people who have been in Dubai for a longer time. I would definitely keep this property longer term and whenever I get married, I would move out into a bigger place, but I plan to keep this property until that happens. I don't want to sell it. I would rent it out, but if I do rent it out it would be to a family that values it because of its Vastu compliance. It's almost like a five-star accommodation in the middle of the Marina.
The National
02-04-2025
- Business
- The National
My Own Home: Dh1 million JVC property valued Dh300k higher in just two months
My Own Home takes you inside a reader-owned property to ask how much they paid, why they decided to buy and what they have done with it since moving in While Rashmi Prabhakar Kalra's husband had originally wanted to buy a property in their home country of India, Ms Kalra saw an opportunity investing in UAE real estate. A qualified lawyer, Ms Kalra moved to Dubai the year before the Covid-19 pandemic broke out, just after they'd got married, and they rented accommodation in Al Barsha. But then they had two children and decided to take the plunge and buy. While Ms Kalra wanted to continue living in Al Barsha, as she loves how central it is, she couldn't find a suitable home for sale, so she looked nearby and found the perfect Dh1 million, two-bedroom JVC apartment. They love it so much, they're already planning to buy a second property in the area soon. The National takes a look around. The layout is well-suited for our family. The best part about the home is the balcony. It's huge. We can sit and enjoy our tea or coffee there. We don't often have backyards or front yards nowadays, so big balconies are a plus. This home has a really good vibe and it's properly made. I love cooking and my husband loves eating, so I needed a kitchen that is either fully closed or at least semi-closed. This is a semi-closed kitchen, and they've utilised the space so well. They have created good space for storage, plus we have two bedrooms and there's one maid's room. The previous owner had converted the maid's room into a storage room, so that works really well for us. We are using it as a pantry as of now, but when I plan to shift my son to another room, that will be his room. We bought the property in September, after my daughter was born, for Dh980,000 ($266,810) – and in December we got an offer for about Dh1.3 million. We were looking for two years. I really wanted a property in Al Barsha, but I don't think there were a lot of properties on sale there, so we went to the nearest area. We narrowed it down to JVC or Silicon Oasis – those were the two shortlisted areas I wanted to move to. Because rents are skyrocketing in Dubai. I have always been a person who feels like wherever you're living, you should own a house there, no matter where you go in the world. Plus, Dubai is one place, when you move here, you cannot move away. It's so safe, the people are so good, plus you get to meet so many communities, so many people from different countries, and they all live together. It's very nice. I really love that my kids get to grow up in such an environment. Firstly, it's close to Al Barsha, plus the gentry here and the locality. They have parks and schools. My son's school is about four minutes down the lane, so it's very good. It was a villa community, but now there's a lot of construction going on here and very good properties coming in. I also really like this area because it's very close to Sheikh Zayed Road. It's close to Al Khail. Only a spa is missing. We have a swimming pool, a gym, plus the corridors are like a play area for the kids. There is no separate play area, but I really like the building. It's very nice. They have huge corridors, so the kids play there, and the other tenants and owners are really good with kids playing in some areas of the building. We painted, of course. I wanted to do some panelling, so we did that. We put some mirrors here and there, just minor things. I changed the washrooms a bit, adding storage. The bathrooms are huge, but I needed storage inside. Maybe I'll renovate the kitchen a bit. But that's it. I'm really happy with my house right now. And for a family of four, this house is absolutely amazing. I really love this property. I don't want to move out of it soon, because I feel that my kids will be fine growing up here. Now we've bought one property here, we're planning to buy another property in maybe another year. We're searching for something small, maybe a townhouse or villa. We will rent it out, stay here for a bit, but in the future it'll be really good for us to have a townhouse here. [The buying process] was so smooth here, plus I got into the laws and they are so clear about everything. Since we've moved to JVC I've seen a lot of townhouses and they're very nicely built. So, I'll be going for JVC only. I don't want to switch my areas again and again. If we get a good price, I'd also look at Al Furjan. If the Metro doesn't come here, that would be our second choice.
