Motor City · Offices · Dubai

Office space in Motor City, priced by what was paid

Every portal in Dubai shows you what a seller is asking. The Land Department records what a buyer actually transferred, and Ejari records what a tenant actually signed. 20 sales and 173 leases in this district say something the listings do not.

21 registered sales · AED 112.16M · 173 registered leases · 1 January – 14 July 2026 · Source: Dubai Land Department
The same district, the same 7 months
Off-plan
1,900
AED / sqft · 11 deals
Median ticket AED 3.58M
Median unit 1,856 sqft
1.2×
Ready
1,551
AED / sqft · 10 deals
Median ticket AED 5.82M
Median unit 3,164 sqft

A foot of Motor City office under construction costs 1.2× a foot you can walk into tomorrow. Quoted as one blended average the number describes neither market and misleads both buyers.

What that does to the yield
173 registered office leases in Motor City clear a median of AED 112,881 per year on 1,152 sqft — that is 103 AED/sqft. The tenant pays that rate regardless of when the building was finished. So the purchase price is the only variable.
Ready @ 1,551
6.6%
Off-plan @ 1,900
5.4%
New leases and renewals are not the same number. 79 new contracts sign at a median 117 AED/sqft; 94 renewals sit at 89. Which of the two you inherit depends on whether the unit comes vacant, and no listing tells you that.
Gross, before service charge, vacancy, and agency cost — a ceiling, not a forecast. And the caveat that matters: an off-plan unit earns nothing at all until handover, so its real first-years return is not 5.4% but zero.

Month by month

Median AED/sqft · complete months only, July excluded as partial
MonthDealsMedian AED/sqft
January 202641,5511,7751.1×
February 202671,7401,9001.1×
March 20262—1,975—
April 202642,3381,7000.7×
May 202621,3232,1891.7×
June 202611,363——
July 202611,340——

The median held between 1,363 and 2,020 across 6 complete months — a 48% spread. Any single comparable you are shown sits somewhere in that band, and where it sits is the difference between a fair price and a story.

What AED 3.58M actually buys here

Off-plan stock · 11 registered sales · whole segment: 20 deals
10th percentile
2.05M
smallest tickets clearing
Median ticket
3.67M
1,888 sqft typical
75th percentile
5.41M
larger-floorplate territory
90th percentile
9.01M
above this is rare

The entry point is where most assumptions break. A tenth of registered sales here cleared under AED 2,048,506, and the top decile starts at AED 9,008,300 — a 4-fold range inside one district and one segment. A quoted “Motor City price” without a size attached to it is not information.

Motor City against everything else

Median AED/sqft, registered office sales, same window · districts with 10+ deals and registered rent
Trade Centre First →
5,372
Jaddaf Waterfront →
2,499
Motor City
1,800
International City Phase 1 →
1,541
Dubai Investment Park First →
705

Motor City registered 20 office sales in the period. International City Phase 1 registered 48. Depth is what makes an exit possible: a district that prices itself off hundreds of comparables does not depend on whoever happens to show up.

Every district on this list has its own page, built the same way from the same register. All districts →

A commercial foot against a residential one

Same district, same window
Offices
1,800
20 deals · AED/sqft
Retail
4,375
50 deals · AED/sqft
Apartments
1,660
1,309 deals · AED/sqft

A commercial foot in Motor City costs 1.08 times a residential one. That premium is ordinary for a district with real business demand — and it is the number to hold up against any pitch that treats the two as interchangeable.

Questions people actually ask

Answered from the register, not from a brochure
How much does an office cost in Motor City?
Across 20 registered sales between January and July 2026, the median was AED 3,668,944 at 1,800 AED/sqft. 11 of those were off-plan stock, clearing AED 3,577,888 at 1,900 AED/sqft. The other side of the market is too thin here to publish a median against — which is itself worth knowing before you buy.
What rent does an office in Motor City actually achieve?
173 registered leases show a median of AED 112,881 per year on a median 1,152 sqft, which is 103 AED/sqft/year. The number splits: 79 new leases sign at 117 AED/sqft, 94 renewals sit at 89 — a vacant unit lets for more than a tenanted one delivers.
What yield will an office in Motor City produce?
Against the registered rate of 103 AED/sqft, off-plan stock at 1,900 produces roughly 5.4% gross. Both are before service charge, vacancy and agency cost, so treat them as ceilings rather than forecasts. And off-plan earns nothing at all until handover, which the percentage does not show.
Is an office more expensive per foot than an apartment in Motor City?
Yes — 1,800 against 1,660 across 1,309 registered apartment sales, so 1.08 times. Commercial foot sits above the residential one here, which is worth checking before you assume one is the cheaper way into the district.
How does Motor City compare with other Dubai office districts?
International City Phase 1 1,541 across 48 deals, Trade Centre First 5,372 across 25 deals, Dubai Investment Park First 705 across 16 deals, Jaddaf Waterfront 2,499 across 11 deals. Motor City registered 20 sales in the period. Depth matters most when you want to sell: a district with hundreds of comparables gives a valuer something to work with, a district with a dozen does not.
You have the district's numbers. Now the one that matters: is the price you were quoted the price this market pays?
Send the unit you are looking at. You get it checked against the DLD comparables above — what was actually paid in the same building, at the same size, in the same month. Free, no obligation, no subscription.
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Methodology. Every figure is AED per square foot. The DLD export records area in square metres — median 79.0 across the file — and is converted at 10.764 sqft/m², with the unit decided once for the dataset rather than row by row. Offices means PROP_TYPE Unit with sub-type Office: the sub-types labelled “Commercial” and “Industrial” in DLD data are almost entirely land, and mixing them in drags the commercial median from 3,302 to 1,919 across Dubai. USAGE_EN is not used to classify sales — every office in the file is tagged “Residential” in that column. Duplicate transaction numbers are collapsed after filtering to Sales, and Mortgage and Gift registrations are excluded. Rent covers 1 January – 14 July 2026 and comes from registered Ejari contracts, filtered to PROP_TYPE Unit above 200 sqft and AED 30,000 to strip flexi-desks and business addresses. Ejari carries no contract number, so lease records are never de-duplicated: identical amounts registered in the same batch are separate units in separate buildings, and collapsing them understates the median rate by 9%. DLD records sales under marketing district names and Ejari under official community names; the two are matched through shared project names, never by hand. Medians throughout, never averages. Districts below 10 registered sales get no page. Registered transactions only: this is what was paid, not what was asked.
Disclaimer. This analysis reflects the independent opinion of OSNOVA Property, based on publicly available Dubai Land Department data at the time of publication. It is not financial, legal, or investment advice, and does not constitute an offer, recommendation, or guarantee of returns, capital appreciation, or rental yield. Yield figures are gross and illustrative. Past registered transactions are not a reliable indicator of future prices. Property investment carries risk, including loss of capital. Verify all figures independently and take professional advice before committing funds. OSNOVA Property is a licensed brokerage and may act for a party to a transaction discussed here.