Motor City · Retail · Dubai

Retail 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. 50 sales and 125 leases in this district say something the listings do not.

56 registered sales · AED 371.20M · 125 registered leases · 1 January – 14 July 2026 · Source: Dubai Land Department
What this district actually trades
Off-plan
4,500
AED / sqft · 49 deals
Median ticket AED 4.18M
Median unit 1,017 sqft

Only 7 ready sales registered in 7 months — below the ten-deal threshold at which a median means anything. So this page publishes off-plan stock only. Anyone quoting you a ready comparable in Motor City is working from a handful of deals.

What that does to the yield
125 registered retail leases in Motor City clear a median of AED 367,500 per year on 1,481 sqft — that is 259 AED/sqft. The tenant pays that rate regardless of when the building was finished. So the purchase price is the only variable.
Off-plan @ 4,500
5.8%
New leases and renewals are not the same number. 49 new contracts sign at a median 282 AED/sqft; 76 renewals sit at 250. 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 5.5% but zero.

Month by month

Median AED/sqft · complete months only, July excluded as partial
MonthDealsMedian AED/sqft
January 202621,862——
February 202641,7782,7501.5×
March 202631—4,695—
April 20263—5,000—
May 20263—4,500—
June 202642,0004,9992.5×
July 20266—4,498—

The median held between 1,862 and 5,000 across 6 complete months — a 168% 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 4.28M actually buys here

Off-plan stock · 44 registered sales · whole segment: 50 deals
10th percentile
2.61M
smallest tickets clearing
Median ticket
4.34M
1,264 sqft typical
75th percentile
6.75M
larger-floorplate territory
90th percentile
12.23M
above this is rare

The entry point is where most assumptions break. A tenth of registered sales here cleared under AED 2,605,520, and the top decile starts at AED 12,228,835 — a 5-fold range inside one district and one segment. A quoted “Motor City price” without a size attached to it is not information.

Where the off-plan money went

Projects with 5+ registered off-plan sales · median AED/sqft
Sobha Orbis
5,000
15 Cascade
3,842
Velos Residence
2,847

Sobha Orbis alone took 23 of the 44 off-plan sales — 52% of that side of the district in a single project. Concentration like this matters: when one building sets the median, the “district price” you are quoted is really that building's price.

Motor City against everything else

Median AED/sqft, registered retail sales, same window · districts with 10+ deals and registered rent
Motor City
4,375
Majan →
2,437
Dubai Marina →
2,108
Jumeirah Lakes Towers →
1,967
Arjan →
1,697

Motor City registered 50 retail sales in the period. Majan registered 64. 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 2.64 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 a retail unit cost in Motor City?
Across 50 registered sales between January and July 2026, the median was AED 4,336,150 at 4,375 AED/sqft. 44 of those were off-plan stock, clearing AED 4,278,012 at 4,700 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 a retail unit in Motor City actually achieve?
125 registered leases show a median of AED 367,500 per year on a median 1,481 sqft, which is 259 AED/sqft/year. The number splits: 49 new leases sign at 282 AED/sqft, 76 renewals sit at 250 — a vacant unit lets for more than a tenanted one delivers.
What yield will a retail unit in Motor City produce?
Against the registered rate of 259 AED/sqft, off-plan stock at 4,700 produces roughly 5.5% 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 a retail unit more expensive per foot than an apartment in Motor City?
Yes — 4,375 against 1,660 across 1,309 registered apartment sales, so 2.64 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 retail unit districts?
Majan 2,437 across 64 deals, Arjan 1,697 across 51 deals, Jumeirah Lakes Towers 1,967 across 35 deals, Dubai Marina 2,108 across 16 deals. Motor City registered 50 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. Retail means PROP_TYPE Unit with sub-type Shop: 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.