Questions

The reader, and nobody else. We take no commission from an agent, a developer, a lender or a broker, and a report costs the same whatever it says.

That is why the verdict can be no.

No. We keep a directory of UAE mortgage brokers who have asked to be listed and whose details we have checked. It is in alphabetical order, nobody pays to be in it or to be placed higher, and we take no referral fee. A listing is not a recommendation.

The directory is kept apart from the reports: no report or email of a report names a broker. Check a broker’s licence and registration yourself before you engage one.

The mortgage-broker directory

Nine sections, each a question, and it opens with the answer: should you buy it, yes, no, or only on a condition, with each reason and what would change it.

Then the working. Is the price right, against registered sales. Is the rent realistic, against registered tenancies. What the building really costs to hold, from the service charge its owners’ association filed. What it costs to buy. What the loan does to it. What happens if it goes wrong. What you walk away with in each year to ten. How it was all worked out, with every source and date.

A home bought off plan has a tenth section, on when the money is due.

When a check fails on your own figures, or on the building’s registered service charge. Three checks can fail: the asking price is above nearly all registered sales in the building or its project and well over their median; the net yield is below the Central Bank’s base rate; the first year’s net income does not cover the mortgage interest. A deposit under the Central Bank’s minimum for the buyer (50% off-plan, say) cannot buy the loan, so the figures are worked on the minimum and the report says so.

A check that fails only at the registered rent gives a conditional answer, unless the rent you expect is far above the register. So does a weaker warning, and so does a price that could not be checked against registered sales. Each no and each condition comes with the figure that would change it, and the last section of a report sets out the rules.

Registered sales, rent contracts and owners’ association service charges are published by the Dubai Land Department through Data Dubai, the emirate’s open-data portal.

Asking figures are always called asking. In a report they are the price and the rent you give us, and they are never counted as evidence. On our pages they are what a portal advertises for an area, with the portal named.

Every figure in a report names its source and the day we read it. A figure that fails our reliability checks does not reach a report.

The calculator works for a property in any emirate, with a transfer fee for each. Dubai’s and Abu Dhabi’s fees are checked against the registry’s own schedule; the other five are not yet, and the form says so.

The registered evidence is Dubai’s, because Dubai publishes its register as open data. For a property elsewhere the report works the sums on the figures you give it, says what could not be checked, and gives no answer better than a conditional one.

A report prints a registered figure only when at least 10 registered records stand behind it. With fewer for your building it moves up a level, to the project, the community or the area, names the level it used and says how many records it held back.

If no level has enough, the report says that the price could not be checked against registered sales, and its answer is then no better than a conditional one.

No. A report sets out what was registered and what is asked, and works the sums. It is not a valuation, a forecast or advice, and it does not replace a lawyer, a lender’s valuer or a survey of the property.

Nobody can tell you whether they will, and we do not forecast.

A report shows what a fall would do to this purchase. It works the same sums again with a lower rent, a higher mortgage rate, an empty flat and a lower sale price, one at a time and together, and shows the point at which the purchase stops working.

The arithmetic is exact and you can check it: a report shows how each figure was worked out. The answer is only as good as what goes in. Use the rent a tenant would pay today, not the rent a listing hopes for, and the service charge on the building’s own budget where you have it.

For an apartment in Dubai it starts from a service charge of AED 17 a sq ft, 5% of the year empty, a management fee of 5% of the rent, prices rising 5% a year and rents rising 2% a year. Each default is shown in the form with its source, and you can change any of them.

The growth figures are assumptions, not forecasts. Set them to zero to see the purchase stand on its rent alone.

Results on screen are free and we do not ask for your email. A saved analysis and a one-page PDF are free with your email. The premium report is priced per report, with no subscription. The price, or a free period if one is running, is shown before you ask for a report.

No. You can run the numbers and read the results without one. An account keeps your analyses in one place, lets you return to a report, and lets you compare two to four properties.

Yes, for a Dubai report, in two cases. If the report could not set the asking price against registered sales at any level (the building, the project, the community or the area), or if it has a material error in its calculation, write to hello@yieldpulse.io within 14 days of buying it and we refund it in full. One email is enough. There is no form to fill in.

You know which case applies before you pay: the results page says whether your asking price can be set against registered sales, and at which level. A report on a property outside Dubai is worked from your own figures, and says so before you pay; a calculation error in it is refunded the same way.

While reports are free, nothing is charged, so there is nothing to refund. Outside these cases a sale is final, because a report is delivered at once, unless a fault on our side stops you opening it.

Read clause 4 of the terms

Payment is taken by Stripe. Your card number goes to Stripe and never reaches us or our servers.

Yes. It stays in your account and you can read it or download the PDF again. A report is dated: it describes the figures on the day it was made, and the market moves.

On a Dubai purchase at AED 1,000,000 with a loan of AED 800,000, the calculator counts AED 86,260 in all. The larger lines: the Land Department’s transfer fee, AED 40,000; the agent’s commission with VAT, AED 21,000; the bank’s arrangement fee with VAT, AED 8,400; registering the mortgage, AED 2,270; and the registration trustee, AED 4,200.

A cash buyer pays none of the lender’s lines. The calculator lists every line for your own figures.

20% under AED 5 million and 30% at or above for an expatriate's first mortgaged property; 40% for a second or later one; five points less for a UAE national; 50% for any off-plan purchase. Source: Central Bank of the UAE, Regulations Regarding Mortgage Loans (C 31/2013, as amended; consolidated 8 April 2020). A UAE national may borrow a little more, and a buyer who does not live in the UAE is usually asked for more.

The calculator will not let a deposit fall below the minimum for the price you enter.

The rate your bank quotes you. The calculator starts from a reference rate that we set from published bank rates, and shows the day it was last reviewed beside the field.

For context, the Central Bank of the UAE’s base rate has been 3.90% since 17 September 2026, and on 9 October 2026 the interbank rate (EIBOR) stood at 4.19% for three months, 4.55% for six and 4.84% for a year.

It is what the owners of a building pay each year for its upkeep: cleaning, security, lifts, the pool, the reserve for repairs. It is charged per square foot and it is the owner’s cost, not the tenant’s.

It differs widely from one building to the next, which is why a report uses the building’s own filed budget where there is one. Ask the seller for the latest invoice before you rely on any figure.

The UAE has no personal income tax, no capital gains tax and no yearly property tax. Ordinary rent earned by an individual from letting property is outside corporate tax.

Holiday letting is different. A holiday-home permit counts as a licence, which brings that income into the test for a business, and an individual is then taxed only if business turnover passes AED 1,000,000 in a calendar year. A company pays corporate tax at 9% on taxable income above AED 375,000.

If you are tax resident somewhere else, that country may tax the rent. Ask an adviser there.

Dubai’s register of tenancy contracts. A tenancy has to be registered, and registration is what a tenant needs to connect water and electricity. The calculator allows AED 220 for it.

Choose “Forgot password” on the sign-in page and enter your email. We send a link to set a new one. If it does not arrive, look in your spam folder, then write to us.

It is in your dashboard, under the email you paid with, and we send an email when it is ready. Look in your spam folder for that email. If you find neither, write to hello@yieldpulse.io with the email you used to pay.

In your dashboard, once you are signed in with the email you used. An analysis made without an account stays in that browser only.

Yes, from Profile and settings. It removes your details and your saved analyses. We keep the record of any payment, as the law requires. It cannot be undone, so download any report you want to keep first.

Write to hello@yieldpulse.io or use the contact page. We answer by email.

A report gives a verdict on the numbers of one property and the reasons for it. It is not personal advice: we do not know your circumstances. Use it to ask better questions of the people who do.